Back to the Future

William Bailey (b. 1930)
The Lost Lady, 1985

Richard Benson (b. 1943)
Photographs from the Collection of the Gilman Paper Company, 1985

Venerated New York Times photo critic Vicky Goldberg was once asked which book of photographs she would most like to own. “For ravishing, I would really like (if only I could afford it) Photographs from the Collection of the Gilman Paper Company by the Collection’s curator Pierre Apraxine, with plates by Richard Benson. On two different types of paper that went through up to eight passes on press, the reproductions probably come as close to the originals as offset printing ever gets,” she said. “And after all, the book does cost a lot less than amassing a photography collection.”

Photographs from the Collection of the Gilman Paper Company brings together high quality, hand-printed reproductions of the 200 best works from the Gilman Paper Collection. The original collection was amassed by Howard Gilman, Chairman of the Gilman Paper Company, and his curator Pierre Apraxine from 1977 to 1997, and consists of over 8500 of works that trace the development of photography from its earliest years. Before the collection was acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, it was considered the most important private photography collection in the world; it includes works by American, French, British, and other photographers that span from the late nineteenth to early twentieth century. Represented in the collection are the artists Alfred Stieglitz, Man Ray, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Lewis Carroll, Aleksandr Rodchenko, Nadar, William-Henry Fox Talbot, Roger Fenton, Eugène Atget, Diane Arbus, and Walker Evans, among other important figures in the history of photography. Also included are important works documenting the Civil War and abolitionist movement. When the Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired the collection in 2005, Malcolm Daniel, the museum’s curator of photography, told The New York Times, “For at least the last 15 years, the acquisition of the Gilman collection has been our No.1 priority and goal.”

The images were originally hung in the Gilman Paper Company offices in the Time/Life Building, but when sunlight and poor air quality began to cause damage to the photographs, Gilman and Apraxine requested that identical reproductions be made. In 1985, they hired former Yale School of Art Dean and MacArthur Genius Richard Benson to reproduce 200 of the best images in the collection for an ambitious publication. The prints, like the photographs they reproduce, are works of art in themselves; over the course of over four years and using sophisticated and meticulous printing techniques, Benson ensured that the prints for the book would be barely distinguishable from the originals. Using a 300-line magenta half-tone screen and a press installed in his basement, Benson created negatives for the offset printing of each work. Each is tipped to an individual leaf and reproduced in original size from the original photograph (except those exceeding the volume’s size). Benson made multiple halftone films from each photograph, exposed those films to plates, and printed the plates on a single-color sheet-fed offset printing press. The history of the making of the book is captured in this video.
The final book is an edition of only 1200, and was a landmark publication; it was featured in the Grolier Club’s A Century for the Century: Fine Printed Books 1900-1999, which hailed “the extraordinary care expended in the cause of fine printing,” where “neither care nor expense was spared in striving for the most accurate reproductions possible of this collection of monuments from the history of photography.”

Highlights from the book include rare masterworks by Roger Fenton, portraits by Julia Margaret Cameron and Lewis Carroll, a Civil War-era portrait of Abraham Lincoln, landscapes of the American West by Carleton Watkins and Timothy O’Sullivan, and an array of American daguerreotypes. In addition, each photographic plate is accompanied by notes from photography expert Lee Marks. After the Gilman Foundation dissolved, the remaining volumes of this book were placed with libraries and museums. There are only a handful remaining, and they are sure to increase in value.

Ellen Carey (b. 1952)
Pull with Mixed & Off-Set Pods, 2010

Jan Cunningham
Green Arc

In the past year or so, Jan Cunningham has returned to painting following a period focused on taking photograph. She was the recipient of the inaugural Doran Artist Residency in Italy, where she developed a body of photographic images. “In concert with the photographs, indeed because of them, my paintings have become more emptied out and yet more full; my practice in the studio has become almost entirely meditative, and the paintings, acts of meditation. In Green Arc, (2015.04) as in her other recent work, she uses as few elements as possible, letting each element play its role fully. In the course of making the painting, Cunningham seeks to generate as much light and depth, using demarcations, densely layered color, and a few lines.

She describes her work as “geometric abstraction using light and color exclusively, which allows me to access more intuitive, deeper feelings.” She works in a studio filled with natural light, applying oil paint to canvases hung on walls, using brushes to carefully texture the designs, and sometimes a palette knife to remove layers. Cunningham often draws from her paintings, “revisiting a composition as trying to understand it.”

Jan Cunningham received her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and an MFA in Painting from Yale School of Art. She lives and works in New Haven. Cunningham’s work has been exhibited internationally, and locally at the Giampietro Gallery, and a survey exhibition covering ten years of paintings and drawings took place at the Museum of East Texas. She has been awarded residencies including at the Yale University Art Gallery Lewitt/Doran Residency in Amalfi, Italy, MacDowell Colony, and Yaddo.

Bernard Greenwald (b. 1941)
Route 9, Upper Red Hook, New York. 26 june 2013, 2013

Bernard Greenwald was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1941. He received his BFA from the Philadelphia Museum, College of Art and his MFA from Yale University School of Art & Architecture. He lives and paints in Red Hook, New York where he lives with his wife.

Bernard Greenwald makes paintings based on the landscape in the Hudson Valley, near to his home in Red Hook, New York. His primary concern is color and how it expresses light passing through where we live and travel. His paintings depict rural and urban environs, and roads and cars since it is from a moving vehicle a contemporary person usually absorbs the landscape.

Titus Kaphar (b. 1976)
Study: Portrait in Tar I, 2016

This is a study made for a much larger work that will be unveiled at Frieze in May 2016. This newly finished mixed-media piece was made in support of Artspace and the Post Masters Program, a new artist residency program the artist is building in Dixwell/Newhallville neighborhood of New Haven.
Melding fiction and culture, Kaphar slashes, layers, and crumples his work to dramatic effect. All of his work is rooted in personal experiences with a goal to create a dialogue on art, race, and representation. He is represented by Jack Shainman Gallery, NY.
During a time when our nation has been experiencing a wrenching collective consciousness-raising around issues of racial bias in the criminal justice system, Kaphar’s work been much discussed and widely praised. It has been seen on the cover of Time Magazine (Man of the Year issue) and written about it in the New Yorker, WSJ, ArtNews, Huffington Post, the NY Times and many other publications.

Works for The Jerome Project– a portrait series based on his father’s experience behind bars highlights systemic racial bias in our nation’s justice system– are in the collection of PS 1 MOMA. Initially shown in a solo show at the Studio Museum, the series of 99 works was the basis for his project working with teens from New Haven Public Schools at Artspace in 2015—one of only 15 projects in the nation supported by the Surdna Foundation’s new Artists Engaging in Social Change program. Kaphar is the recipient of a prestigious Creative Capital Grant and was the 2009 recipient of he Gwendolyn Knight and Jacob Lawrence fellowship, awarded bi-annually to an emerging black artist, for his exhibition History in the Making.

The artist lives and works in New Haven, where he is developing the Post Master Program, a new artist in residence program for recent MFA graduates, to be located in his neighborhood. Post Masters will be immersed in the community and work in community-based settings in addition to developing their own studio practice. He is also working on a major film.

Nina Katchadourian (b. 1968)
Queen of the Air

Nina Katchadourian was born in Stanford, California and grew up spending summers on a small island in the Finnish archipelago, where she still spends part of each year. She is known for her conceptual works exploring themes of mapping, translation, and public space. Her work exists in a wide variety of media including photography, sculpture, video and sound and has been exhibited at PS1/MoMA, the Serpentine Gallery, London, The Powerplant, Toronto, Artists Space, Sculpture Center, The ICA (Philadelphia), and the Palais de Tokyo, Paris. In 2006, the Tang Museum at Skidmore College exhibited a 10-year retrospective of her work and published the accompanying monograph entitled All Forms of Attraction. In 2014, her work was included in the Brooklyn Art Museum’s landmark exhibit, Crossing Brooklyn. In 2015, her work was included in the 56th International Art Exhibition at the Venice Biennale. At Artspace, she was part of the exhibition Territories (2003, curated by Denise Markonish) and Library Science (2012, curated by Rachel Gugelberger).

She received a BA from Brown and an MFA in Visual Art from UCSD, and attended the Whitney Independent Study Program. Her work is included in the permanent collections of SFMOMA, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, The Dunedin Public Art Gallery, the Saatchi Collection and the Marguiles Collection. Katchadourian has been widely written about (Artforum, Art in America, Art Journal, Art Monthly, Art Review, Art/Text, Canadian Art, frieze, GQ, Modern Painters, New York Magazine, The New York Times, Sculpture, TimeOut, New York, Vogue) and also published in a number of national and international book editions, including the monograph, Sorted Books, published by Chronicle Books in February 2013.

Christopher Mir (b. 1970)
Echo, 2016

In a world saturated with advertising and digital technology, Christopher Mir circumvents the deeply rooted imagery of the media through his primal, idealized dreamscapes. Mir’s paintings depict a metaphysical landscape where mythic, archetypal creatures (goddesses, cavemen, heroines, and spirit animals) combine with futuristic buildings and machinery, pulled from his daily sourced collection of images clipped from Google, magazines, calendars, and original reference photographs. Mir presents bizarre relationships in fantastic, unexpected circumstances, described to contain such dichotomies as the mystical versus the physical, the spiritual versus the secular, and the primal versus the futuristic.

Solo exhibitions at the Matrix Gallery, Wadsworth Atheneum, Rare Gallery, Benrimon Gallery in NY, Giampietro Gallery, New Haven, Galerie TMProject, Geneva, Galleria Senda, Barcelona and Schuster Gallery, Berlin. His work was included in Full Circle: Ten years of Radius at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, representing the most significant artists from those honored by the Aldrich over a decade of the award exhibition program. His work is in the permanent collection of the Yale Art Gallery.Echo, 2016 was created for Artspace’s 30th anniversary. Echo, 2007, was the focal point of his solo show at the Wadsworth Atheneum.

Robert Reed (b. 1938)
Antibes Playground #1 – Norfolkian Constellation, 2007-2009

A prolific and influential visual artist, Reed is best remembered in the Yale/New Haven community as a legendary Yale School of Art professor who inspired and mentored generations of students over the course of his 50-year teaching career. He was known for his “tough love” approach that challenged serious artists and amateurs alike to push their limits and embark on ambitious and creative projects. Robert Storr noted that, after Reed’s death in 2014, he left, “an enormous hole in the heart of the School and a legacy unrivaled in the number of years he taught or the number of young people he initiated into the complexities and satisfactions of artistic practice and thereafter inspired in the pursuit and appreciation of art.” After his passing, one student remarked, “I learned more from [Reed] than any other professor.”

The title of the work refers to the Yale Norfolk Summer Program, which Reed attended in 1960 and later directed from 1970-1975. Antibes Playground #1 was included in the retrospective of Reed’s work held at the Yale School of Art in fall 2015, and was more recently the focal point of “New Genealogies: 2016”, also at the School of Art. It was also included in his 2013 solo exhibition at Baylor University’s Martin Museum of Art. Part of a series produced in Antibes, France between 2003 and 2013, the work show Reed’s signature style of geometric abstraction, and evidence of the ingenuity and visual complexity for which his pieces are known.

Reed’s work has been collected and exhibited at the Whitney Museum of American Art (as part of the re-opening inaugural American is Hard to See, in 2015), the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Walker Art Center, the Albright-Knox Gallery, and the Yale University Art Gallery, among others. He has received recognition in the form of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from Minneapolis College of Art and Design, and the College Art Association’s Distinguished Teaching Art Award. Reed’s work will undoubtedly rise in value continue as he gains posthumous acclaim.

Robert Reed (1938-2014)
Antibes Playground #4 – Norfolkian Constellation, 2006-2009

Yale School of Art Professor Robert Reed taught at Yale for almost 50 years. At the time of his death, he was the only fully-tenured African-American faculty member at the art school. A prolific and influential visual artist, he is best remembered for inspiring and mentoring generations of students through his class Basic Drawing. He also served as Director of the Yale Norfolk Summer Program and of the Institute for Studio Studies, in Auvillar, France. At the time of Reed’s death, Dean Robert Storr noted that he left, “an enormous hole in the heart of the School and a legacy unrivaled in the number of years he taught or the number of young people he initiated into the complexities and satisfactions of artistic practice and thereafter inspired in the pursuit and appreciation of art.” At his memorial service, one Yale student remarked, “I learned more from [Reed] than any other professor.”

Reed’s early work was influenced by the abstract, geometric works of New York artists in the 1960s and 1970s. He developed his bodies of work over long periods, including the series “Galactic Journal, from which Antibes Playground # 4 comes. This collection looks at the structure and mechanics of complex systems through precisionist techniques. This particular work was included in his 2013 solo exhibition at Baylor University’s Martin Museum of Art. At the time Reed said: “My recent [work] is driven by process and improvisation. The initial compositions are informed by photographs of cellular or satellite images chosen for their color and complexity, but I depart from the source of imagery as [the image] takes on a life of its own.” The title, Antibes Playground # 4, refers to the Yale Norfolk Summer Program, which Reed attended in 1960 and later directed from 1970-1975.

Reed’s work has also been collected and exhibited at the Whitney Museum of American Art (as part of the re-opening inaugural American is Hard to See, in 2015), the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Walker Art Center, the Albright-Knox Gallery, and the Yale University Art Gallery, among others. He was a Yaddo Fellow and a board member of McDowell Colony and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. His work was supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from Minneapolis College of Art and Design, and the College Art Association’s Distinguished Teaching Art Award. Reed’s work will undoubtedly rise in value continue as he gains posthumous acclaim.

Ronnie Rysz
Portrait

“My mixed media collages, drawings and prints incorporate multiple layers of methodically constructed forms, dense textures, explosive patterns and fluid lines. I reference music, movies, news and advertising to make sardonic representations of American pop culture. Repurposing and using inexpensive, readily available materials is important to my practice. Many of these items have their own history and individual meaning and add another layer of narrative to my work. Some of the materials that I collect and utilize include acrylic paint, enamel, ephemera, ink, foil, glitter, buttons, marker, paper, rhinestones, spray paint, tape, office supplies, wallpaper and plastic jewelry. I gravitate toward the definitive shapes of WPA graphics, the confrontational composition of Expressionism, the stylization of ancient icons, the fractured space of Cubism, the patterns of Easter European folk art, and the confident mark making of Modernism, and I synthesize these elements in tandem with my collected materials to achieve a distinct style.”

Rysz received a BFA from Lyme Academy College of Fine Art and studied Fine Art and Illustration at the School of Visual Arts. His work is included in collection of the Slater Memorial Museum, the Housatonic Museum, the Print Club of Albany, and several private collections. His work has been exhibited at Real Art Ways, Silvermine Arts Center, Center for Contemporary Printmaking, Artspace, the Akus Gallery at ESCU. In 2015, he was in two solo exhibitions, at EBK Gallery Hartford and at DaSilva Gallery. He is the recipient of a Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism Fellowship, a Change, Inc. Grant, and a Vermont Studio Center Fellowship.

Alfred Stieglitz (1864-1936)
The Steerage, 1907

The Steerage is one of the most acclaimed photographs ever taken, and its influence on the development of the medium cannot be understated. The image represents a turning point in the evolution of photography, and also a landmark moment in the career of the celebrated photographer Alfred Stieglitz; many have hailed it as the artist’s first truly “modernist” picture.

After an illustrious career, Stieglitz recognized The Steerage’s importance in his oeuvre: “If all my photographs were lost, and I’d be represented by just one, The Steerage,” he said, “I’d be satisfied.” Alfred Stieglitz is a defining figure in history of photography, dedicated to elevating the medium of photography to the status of fine art. To this end, he founded the Photo-Secession exhibition society, and its associated periodical, Camera Work, to promote photography as an artistic medium. Stieglitz himself oversaw the printing of this image when it was reproduced for Camera Work, creating a special link between this particular print and the artist himself.

Stieglitz captured this image during a 1907 sea voyage from New York to Bremen, Germany. It depicts the steerage-class passengers — most likely immigrants who were denied entry into the United States and who were making the solemn journey back to Europe — aboard the ocean liner Kaiser Wilhelm II. Although the image has historically been viewed as a monument to the immigrant experience, Stieglitz was actually more interested in the formal elements of the composition than any social message. Reflecting on his experience making the image, Stieglitz said, “As I came to the end of the [deck of the ship] I stood alone, looking down. The whole scene fascinated me… I saw a picture of shapes and underlying that the feeling I had about life…Here would be a picture based on related shapes and on the deepest human feeling, a step in my own evolution, a spontaneous discovery.” Abandoning his previous Pictorialist style that favored a single, central subject, and a clear narrative, The Steerage focuses instead on shape and line and thus represents a critical moment in the development of his art. Describing the scene, Stieglitz recalled, “A round straw hat, the funnel leading out, the stairway leaning right, the white drawbridge with its railings made of circular chains – white suspenders crossing on the back of a man in the steerage below, round shapes of iron machinery, a mast cutting into the sky, making a triangular shape. I stood spellbound for a while, looking and looking.”

An art-filled weekend in Columbus, Ohio

Discover the charms of Ohio’s capital city and the burgeoning contemporary art scene in Columbus. Spend your weekend at the new four star luxury art hotel, The Joseph (designed by Architectonica) in the charming Short North neighborhood. The hotel (a part of Le Meridien Group) features work by KAWS, Nari Ward, Fred Wilson and many emerging artists. Columbus’ top three museums will each arrange for one of their curators to give you a behind-the- scenes private tour: the new Pizzuti Collection (a museum housing the collection of Ron and Ann Pizzutti which includes the work of several past Artspace-exhibiting artists, notably Titus Kaphar, Carrie Moyer, and Lisa Sanditz); the Wexner Center for the Arts, a contemporary art gallery on the campus of Ohio State University designed by Peter Eisenman; and the newly-expanded Columbus Museum of Art. An unforgettable way to see contemporary art with leading experts as your guides.

Then, if your schedules align, distinguished artist Ann Hamilton will welcome you into her sprawling studio complex. Hamilton makes large-scale multi-media installations that investigate the body, the voice, and the senses. Her ambitious projects have been presented at the Park Avenue Armory, in NYC, Mass Moca, and last year, at the Henry Museum in Seattle, WA. Among her many honors, Hamilton has been the recipient of the Heinz Award, MacArthur Fellowship (the so-called genius grant), United States Artists Fellowship, NEA Visual Arts Fellowship, Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award, Skowhegan Medal for Sculpture, and the Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship. She represented the US in the 1991 Sao Paulo Bienal, the 1999 Venice Biennale, and has exhibited extensively around the world. She received an MFA in Sculpture from Yale School of Art, and is currently Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Art at OSU.

In the Footsteps of Lewitt on the Amalfi Coast

See the countryside that inspired the influential Connecticut-born artist Sol LeWitt from his own home base! Invite friends to join you for one week at a charming cottage in the LeWitt family’s private compound in the small town of Praiano, in the hills overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea.

Explore Positano and the beautiful Amalfi Coast, enjoy sea views from the garden, visit the working farm, then spend evenings surrounded by LeWitt’s wall drawings—examples of one of the most important aspects of his diverse practice. A perfect escape for foodies, hikers, and anyone looking for a unique and relaxing getaway seeped in art world history. Sleeps six; dates for the week to be mutually agreed upon with the LeWitt Collection. A detailed feature and photo spread of the house appeared in Art in America in 2009.

• Valid for up to 6 people
• Duration 1 week
• Expires 1 year from close of auction
• Transportation to and from Praiano not included
• Cannot be resold or re-auctioned.
• Based upon availability.
• To be scheduled at a mutually agreed upon date.
• Blackout dates may apply.

The site is set on a cliff and is reached by a long series of steps. The conditions may not be suitable for young children or adults with limited mobility.