InterCultura

Last updated

InterCultura, Inc., was a not-for-profit private foundation, based in Fort Worth, Texas with offices in London, England, founded in 1982 by Gordon Dee Smith (president), J. Roderick Grierson (vice-president), Milbry Polk, and several other individuals for the purpose of furthering understanding among cultures by organizing and exchanging international art exhibitions. Over the course of the next 15 years, InterCultura organized and brought to the U.S. over a dozen important exhibitions from countries as diverse as Ethiopia, Japan, Mexico, Russia, and many other nations. Exhibitions of American art were sent abroad by InterCultura in exchange.

Contents

Activities

InterCultura's practice was to bring together the leading scholars with great objects of art to produce exhibitions of outstanding scholarship. InterCultura's activities involved multi-project exchange programs supported by U.S. embassies in foreign countries to send U.S. art abroad in exchange for exhibitions from foreign national collections coming to the U.S.

The Blood of Kings: A New Interpretation of Maya Art

The first major exhibition initiated by InterCultura was "The Blood of Kings: A New Interpretation of Maya Art," which opened at the Kimbell Art Museum in 1986. The Blood of Kings exemplified the InterCultura approach in that it was a presentation of ground-breaking scholarship, curated by two of the leaders of the group of scholars that had recently deciphered the Maya script: Linda Schele, of the University of Texas, and Mary Miller, of Yale University. The exhibition demonstrated, through a never-before-assembled collection of ancient Maya art borrowed from sources as diverse as the British Museum and the Government of Honduras, the imperative of an entirely new approach based on the decipherment of the Maya writing system. It revealed the Maya as real individuals - kings, queens, and royal dynasties as blood-thirsty and colorful as their Old World counterparts. The power of the exhibition was critical in the collapse of the old view of the Maya as peaceable mathematicians, and the emergence of the currently accepted picture of the Maya. The catalog remains a landmark addition to Maya scholarship and is widely cited.

10+10: Contemporary Soviet and American Painters

Starting in 1987, at the dawn of the glasnost era, InterCultura organized an exhibition titled "10 + 10: Contemporary Soviet and American Painters," the first exhibition of dissident or "non-official" art from the then-Soviet Union to be seen in US and Soviet museums. Following on this, in 1988 InterCultura negotiated the most extensive cultural exchange program ever signed between the then-Soviet Ministry of Culture and a private U.S. institution. Included was the most extensive exhibition presented in the US of the 19th century Russian group of painters called the Wanderers, titled "The Wanderers: Masters of 19th Century Russian Painting." The InterCultura US-Soviet exhibition exchange program survived the change from the Soviet Union to post-Soviet Russia, and the exchange concluded in 1993 with the most important exhibition of Medieval Russian art ever shown in the United States, a show of treasures from the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg titled "The Gates of Mystery," , which was also seen in the UK at the Victoria & Albert Museum.

Other exhibitions

Other exhibitions organized by InterCultura included "The Art of Private Devotion: Mexican Retablo Painting," the first major exhibition of Ethiopian art borrowed from Ethiopian sources ever held in the U.S., titled "African Zion: Sacred Art of Ethiopia," the first major exhibition of the art of American painter Robert Motherwell shown in Mexico, titled "Robert Motherwell: An Open Door,", a major exhibition of Georgia O'Keeffe shown in Mexico and Japan, titled "Georgia O'Keeffe: American and Modern,", an exhibition of contemporary Japanese art, titled "Seven Artists: Aspects of Contemporary Japanese Art," and numerous additional shows on subjects ranging from modern Italian master drawings to Mexican dance masks.

Museums with exhibitions

Museums at which InterCultura Exhibitions were shown include: Albright-Knox Art Gallery (Buffalo), Art Institute of Chicago, California Afro-American Museum (Los Angeles), Central Exhibition Hall (St. Petersburg, Russia), Cincinnati Art Museum, Corcoran Gallery of Art (Washington, D.C.), Dallas Museum of Art, Davenport Museum of Art, DuSable Museum of African American History (Chicago), Field Museum of Natural History, Fort Worth Museum of Science and History, Hayward Gallery (London), Henry Art Gallery (University of Washington), Kimbell Art Museum, Milwaukee Art Museum, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Museum of African-American Life & Culture (Dallas), Palacio de Bellas Artes (Mexico City), Rufino Tamayo Museum (Mexico City), San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Sarah Blaffer Gallery (Houston), Serpentine Gallery (London), State Picture Gallery of Georgia (Tbilisi), The Art Museum, Princeton University, The Schomburg Center for Research in Black African Culture (New York), The Walters Art Museum, Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow), Victoria and Albert Museum (London), Yokohama Art Museum (Japan), and others.

Dissolution

Following the departure of its president Gordon Dee Smith and vice president Roderick Grierson, after a decade and a half of creating and touring exhibitions, InterCultura was dissolved in 1996.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Taos art colony</span> Art colony founded in Taos, New Mexico, United States

The Taos art colony was an art colony founded in Taos, New Mexico, by artists attracted by the culture of the Taos Pueblo and northern New Mexico. The history of Hispanic craftsmanship in furniture, tin work, and other mediums also played a role in creating a multicultural tradition of art in the area.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Diego Rivera</span> Mexican muralist (1886–1957)

Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez, known as Diego Rivera, was a prominent Mexican painter. His large frescoes helped establish the mural movement in Mexican and international art.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georgia O'Keeffe</span> American modernist artist (1887–1986)

Georgia Totto O'Keeffe was an American modernist painter and draftswoman whose career spanned seven decades and whose work remained largely independent of major art movements. Called the "Mother of American modernism", O'Keeffe gained international recognition for her meticulous paintings of natural forms, particularly flowers and desert-inspired landscapes, which were often drawn from and related to places and environments in which she lived.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alfred Stieglitz</span> American photographer (1864–1946)

Alfred Stieglitz was an American photographer and modern art promoter who was instrumental over his 50-year career in making photography an accepted art form. In addition to his photography, Stieglitz was known for the New York art galleries that he ran in the early part of the 20th century, where he introduced many avant-garde European artists to the U.S. He was married to painter Georgia O'Keeffe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Palacio de Bellas Artes</span> Cultural centre in Mexico City

The Palacio de Bellas Artes is a prominent cultural center in Mexico City. This hosts performing arts events, literature events and plastic arts galleries and exhibitions. "Bellas Artes" for short, has been called the "art cathedral of Mexico", and is located on the western side of the historic center of Mexico City which is close to the Alameda Central park.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art</span> Art museum in Missouri, United States

Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art opened in 1994 in Kansas City, Missouri. With a $5 million annual budget and approximately 75,000 visitors each year, it is Missouri's first and largest contemporary museum.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Enrique Tábara</span> Ecuadorian painter (1930–2021)

Luis Enrique Tábara was a master Ecuadorian painter and teacher representing a whole Hispanic pictorial and artistic culture.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georgia O'Keeffe Museum</span> Art museum and historic property in New Mexico, USA

The Georgia O'Keeffe Museum is dedicated to the artistic legacy of Georgia O'Keeffe, her life, American modernism, and public engagement. It opened on July 17, 1997, eleven years after the artist's death. It comprises multiple sites in two locations: Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Abiquiu, New Mexico. In addition to the founding Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, the O'Keeffe includes: the Library and Archive within its research center at the historic A.M. Bergere house; the Education Annex for youth and public programming; Georgia O'Keeffe's historic Abiquiu Home and Studio; the O'Keeffe Welcome Center in Abiquiu; and Museum Stores in both Santa Fe and Abiquiu. Georgia O'Keeffe's additional home at the Ghost Ranch property is also part of the O'Keeffe Museum's assets, but is not open to the public.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Francisco Toledo</span> Mexican artist (1940–2019)

Francisco Benjamín López Toledo was a Mexican Zapotec painter, sculptor, and graphic artist. In a career that spanned seven decades, Toledo produced thousands of works of art and became widely regarded as one of Mexico's most important contemporary artists. An activist as well as an artist, he promoted the artistic culture and heritage of Oaxaca state. Toledo was considered part of the Breakaway Generation of Mexican art.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth</span> Art museum in Texas, United States

The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth is an art museum of post-World War II art in Fort Worth, Texas with a collection of international modern and contemporary art. Founded in 1892, The Modern is located in the city's cultural district in a building designed by architect Tadao Ando which opened to the public in 2002. The museum is accredited by the American Alliance of Museums and holds a permanent collection with more than 3,000 works of art.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rafael Coronel</span> Mexican painter (1932–2019)

Rafael Coronel was a Mexican painter. He was the son-in-law of Diego Rivera.

Cundo Bermúdez, born Secundino (Cundo) Bermúdez y Delgado, was a Cuban painter. Born in Havana, Cuba, he died of a heart attack in his Westchester home on October 30, 2008.

Jorge Noceda Sánchez was Dominican-born American diplomat, and painter. His surrealist artwork has been collected by international museums. He also worked as a gastroeonerolgist, and a dog breeder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Waldemar Sjölander</span>

Gustav Waldemar Sjölander Johnson was a Swedish painter, printmaker and sculptor, who developed most of his career in Mexico. He immigrated to the country just after World War II, after establishing himself as an artist in his native Sweden. His career included individual exhibitions in venues such as the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico and the Konstakademin in Sweden, with his works held by museums in Mexico and Europe.

Javier Arevalo was a contemporary Mexican artist whose work was the subject of many exhibitions, worldwide, including in Europe, Latin America, United States, Mexico and Japan. His influence was greatest in Mexico City, and Guadalajara, Jalisco. He also taught Art at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Todd Webb</span> American photographer

Todd Webb was an American photographer notable for documenting everyday life and architecture in cities such as New York City, Paris as well as from the American west. He traveled extensively during his long life and had important friendships with artists such as Berenice Abbott, Walker Evans, Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O'Keeffe, Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange, and Harry Callahan.

José García Narezo was a Mexican painter and a founding member of the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana.

Olga Dondé was a Mexican artist involved in various fields but best known her still life pieces. She was a self-taught painter, who worked for two years until she decided to enter works in a show in 1968. From then she had about 100 showings of her work, including more than forty individual exhibitions in Mexico, the United States, South Americana and Europe. She also founded artistic organizations, an art gallery and a publishing house. Dondé’s work was recognized by admission in the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana, among other honors and her work continues to be shown and honored after her death.

Myriam de la Riva is a Mexican artist known for her small scale works as well as portable murals. She was born in Mexico City to a European family in exile. She studied art in both Mexico and the United States as well as with a number of notable Mexican artists. The artist has had over fifty individual exhibitions and her work has been shown in over 500 collective shows. Her work has been recognized with membership in the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana, among other awards.

William Clift is an American photographer known for his black-and-white imagery of landscapes and of architectural subjects. Most of his work has been made in New Mexico, including Santa Fe where he has lived and worked since 1971, and of Mont Saint Michel in France, and St. Louis, MO.

References