The Carnegie Arts Center will display the works of a legendary artist in a groundbreaking exhibit this fall.
From Sep. 15 until mid-January, the Carnegie will showcase the exhibit “Picasso: 25 Years of Edition Ceramics from the Rosenbaum Collection.”
The exhibit, which features ceramics created by Pablo Picasso in collaboration with George and Suzanne Ramie and the artisans at their Madoura pottery workshop in France, will begin its national tour at the Carnegie Arts Center in Turlock.
“It’s always an exciting time to have a great artist like Picasso on exhibit,” said Rebecca Phillips Abbott, Executive Director and Curator at the Carnegie Arts Center. “He was active and famous for nearly three quarters of the 20th century, and was the first to introduce a number of different art movements. As it relates to ceramics, Picasso was the earliest to treat it as a fine art discipline like sculpture and painting.”
In 1946, Picasso began making ceramics after seeing the works of the Madoura potters at a crafts fair. At the fair, Picasso made three pots in a single day. He began working seriously with ceramics one year later and continued to do so until two years before his death in 1973.
“He was around 66 years old when he started ceramics,” said Abbott. “He already had a wealth of experience throughout his years in art, and applied his experience in those disciplines to ceramics.”
Over the course of twenty years Picasso produced more than 4,000 ceramics, including sculptural works and decorated traditional objects such as plates, bowls and vases.
“What is fascinating about these works is that they depict subjects that delight us all,” aid Abbotts. “At the same time, each object can be seen as a complex blend of painting, sculpture, drawing and printmaking – all in clay.”
The exhibition features 40 ceramic works designed by Picasso and produced in extremely limited editions by the Madoura studio. Two of the pieces are original Picassos.
The exhibit was curated by Gerald Nordland, noted author and independent curator, and former director of the San Francisco Art Museum, the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Washington D.C. Gallery of Modern Art, and the Wight Gallery at University of California, Los Angeles.
The exhibit will be on display at the Carnegie Arts Center from Sep. 15 to Jan. 15, 2014. The Carnegie Arts Center is located at 250 N. Broadway in Turlock.
For more information, visit www.carnegieartsturlock.org.
