Caspar David Friedrich, Woman at a Window, c. 1820
Join art historian Karen Pope for study tours, day trips, and informal luncheon programs to expand your horizons or fill gaps in your world of art. No background or experience is necessary--just curiosity!
Upcoming events, near and far, offer art history experiences in the good company of companions with similar interests.
EXPLORE Recommended temporary museum exhibitions around Texas are listed on this page
CONTACT Add your name to the email list or begin a registration for an event at Contact Art inSight
PARTICIPATE Day Trips, Study Tours, and future destinations are described on the Study Tours page
2024 Art inSight Program Series "The Painters of Modern Life, Courbet through Picasso" Honoring the 150th anniversary of the first "Impressionist" exhibition, this series will focus on the social/urban subjects of the major artists who contributed to the depiction of life in the "new" Paris
Handy, affordable reference (simple maps of Paris neighborhoods, marked with painters' worksites, studios, hangouts) -- lots of used copies online, bring with you: Ellen Williams, The Impressionists' Paris: Walking Tours of the Artists' Studios, Homes, and the Sites They Painted, 1999
Zoom meetings -- Thursdays 10:00-11:00am Austin Time [pre-Zoom and post-Zoom notes and recording]
$20 per person
Coffee meetings -- Fridays 10:00-11:30am [coffee and program @ Neill-Cochran House Museum]
$30 per person
Preregistration is expected--send email to get your name on the attendance list Registration deadline: Monday of the same week
Registration Options:
• Check, payable to Art inSight, mail to:PO Box 5730, Austin TX 78763-5730
•VENMO, I'll send the identification
•CREDIT CARD, via PayPal link (below)
You are welcome to register for multiple dates at once; all 12 COFFEES $350, 12 ZOOMS $200
SCHEDULE (red indicates change from original schedule):
2 Baron Haussmann: Transforming Paris February 22 (Zoom) & 23 (Coffee @ NCHM) √
3 Edouard Manet: Making Art Modern March 14 (Zoom) & 15 (Coffee @ NCHM) √
4 J. M. Whistler: The World Comes to Paris April 11 (Zoom) & 12 (Coffee @ NCHM) √
5 James J. J. Tissot: The Impact of War May 16 (Zoom) & 17 (Coffee 10:30 @ NCHM) √
6 Gustave Caillebotte: Gentlemen at Leisure June 6 (Zoom) & 7 (Coffee @ NCHM) √
7 Claude Monet: Leisure and Fashion July 25 (Zoom) & 26 (Coffee @ NCHM) √
8 Edgar Degas: The Working Class Witnessed Aug 30 Friday (Zoom) & 31 Saturday (Coffee FULL)√
9 Mary Cassatt: Modern Ladies Sept 19 (Zoom) & 20 (Coffee @ NCHM) √
10 Auguste Renoir: Commercial Viabillity October 17 (Zoom) & 18 (Coffee @ NCHM)
11 Georges Seurat: Modernity Refined Nov 14 (Zoom) & 15 (Coffee @ NCHM)
12 Modern Life: Review and Legacy December 5 (Zoom) & 6 (Coffee @ NCHM)
Othmar Schimtowitz, Angels, Leopold Church "Am Steinhof," c.1900, Vienna
Past series:
2023 Great Women Artists, Part II 2022 Women Artists in Their Birthday Months, honoring the 50th anniversary of Feminist Art History Studies, f. 1972 2021 Artists in Their Birthday Months 2020 Masterpieces: Method, Meaning, Context 2019 Great Art Museums, part 2 2018 Great Art Museums, part 1 2017 Great Collectors and Their Collections, part 2 2016 Great Collectors and Their Collections, part 1 2015 Japan & the West 2014 9 Great Cities and Their Depiction by Artists 2013 Back to the Birthdays, Artists in Their Birthday Months 2012 The World's Great Buildings: Milestones in Architecture 2011 Women in Art/Art of Women 2010 Art of Nations: Survey of Art History, One Country at a Time 2009 Angels, Saints and Their Friends in Art History 2008 Time Capsules: A Survey of Seven Centuries 2007 Un-Birthday Parties (for great artists with inconvenient birthdates) 1995-2006 Birthday Parties for great artists, on their true birthdays
Potential Future Series Topics:
Key Works of World Architecture, Stonehenge to Safdie Great Moments in Art History, Antiquity to Modern Perspectives on Movies about Great Artists A Year with Prints: Basics of the major printmaking processes, handling examples, studio and collection visits Art History Survey: Prehistory through the Present Great Works in each medium, one medium at a time, emphasis on process and effect (marble, etching, tempera, etc.)
Texas Museum Exhibition Recommendations and Special Events
This is a selective list. Check museum offerings before you go--
BRISCOE CENTER FOR AMERICAN HISTORY • www.cah.utexas.edu From Commemoration to Education: Pompeo Coppini's Statue of Jefferson Davis Commissioned in 1919 by university regent Major George W. Littlefield the statue was envisioned as part of a much larger allegorical memorial, the Littlefield Fountain, intended to honor Texans who died in the Civil War and World War I while also addressing the reconciliation of the northern and southern states between those wars. However, the memorial and its campus setting and cultural context changed significantly over the course of its development. No longer an object of commemoration, the statue was moved in 2015 and now forms part of a new exhibition that explores the statue's history, as well as its significance as both a work of art and evidence of the past.
The Impressionist Revolution from Monet to Matisse (through November 3, 2024)
Exhibition highlighting one of the great strengths of the DMA collection
From Munch to Kirchner: The Heins Collection of Modern and Expressionist Art (through January 5, 2025)
A recet gift of 30 paintings divided evenly between late 19th- and early 20th-century art movements: Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, and German Expressionism, Heins’s favorite. Highlights include works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Paul Signac, Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, and Edvard Munch—artists who depicted contemporary subjects in an equally contemporary style.
CROW COLLECTION OF ASIAN ART ♦ www.crowcollection.org
Jean Shin: The Museum Body (through June 30, 2025) Site-specific environment by American sculptor who recycles everyday materials with delightful and meaningful results
KIMBELL ART MUSEUM ♦ www.kimbellart.orgDutch Art in a Global Age: Masterpieces from the MFA Bostson (November 10, 2024 - February 9, 2025)DAYTRIP January 16, 2025 -- see details on STUDY TOURS page MODERN ART MUSEUM OF FORT WORTH ♦ www.themodern.org NATIONAL COWGIRL MUSEUM & HALL OF FAME ♦ www.cowgirl.net Dare to Wear: a spectacular display of designer cowgirl fashion
SID RICHARDSON MUSEUMCelebrating Remington & Russell ♦ www.sidrichardsonmuseum.org
BAYOU BEND A Unique Gathering of Americana ♦ www.mfah.org/bayoubend
CONTEMPORARY ARTS MUSEUM ♦ www.camh.org
HOUSTON CENTER FOR CONTEMPORARY CRAFT ♦ www.crafthouston.org
MENIL COLLECTION ♦ www.menil.org
MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS ♦ www.mfah.org
Grounded in Clay: The Spirit of Pueblo Pottery (October 27, 2024 – January 19, 2025)
A collaborative traveling exhibition curated by the Pueblo Pottery Collective and organized by the School for Advanced Research and the Vilcek Foundation, Santa Fe, partnering with with the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture
Gauguin's World (November 3, 2024 - February 16, 2025) The MFAH is the only U.S. venue for this ambitious exhibition showcasing the work of French Post-Impressionist artist Paul Gauguin. Intended to be comprehensive, the exhibition will consist of more than 150 of Gauguin’s paintings, sculptures, prints, and writings. Daytrip November 18, 2024 -- see details on STUDY TOURS page
THE PEARL MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS • www.pearlmfa.org The Pearl is a non-collecting fine art museum, borrowing from public and private collections. The museum complements its exhibitions with an active schedule of programs and services. Founded on the community center concept, the Pearl reaches beyond traditional museums to enlighten, educate, and entertain. The Pearl is housed in a former county library, leased to the museum and renovated through private funds, grants, and gifts. The Pearl is wholly supported through the community. Over 3,000 donors have given to the museum to date.
RIENZI A Home for European Decorative Arts ♦ www.mfah.org/rienzi
Steuben Glass: Stories Engraved in Crystal (ongoing)
THE W. H. STARK HOUSE♦http://www.whstarkhouse.org/ The 14,000 square-foot three-story house built in 1894 by William Henry Stark and his wife, Miriam M. Lutcher Stark, prominent philanthropists who occupied the home until 1936, was designed in the Queen Anne architectural style. It house features a distinctive turret, stained glass windows, and ornate woodwork in cypress and long leaf yellow pine.
As a historic house museum (National Register of Historic Places) it is interpreted to c. 1900 with fifteen rooms of original family furnishings, personal effects and decorative arts, including antique rugs, original textiles, silver, cut glass, and antique porcelain. Also featured are the Stark family’s impressive collections of American Brilliant Period cut glass, pressed and pattern glass, milk glass, porcelains, and other 18th and 19th century decorative accessories.
Attractive Special Exhibitions beyond Texas Not a comprehensive list, just items of interest ... NB: Italics below are a glitch, not meaningful ...
WOW: Chihuly at Biltmore 2024! SEE BELOW
MOST "IMPORTANT" EXHIBITION this Spring:
Holbein at the Tudor Court
Queen's Gallery, Buckingham Palace
1 November 2023 — 14 April 2024
See below
BIG ANNIVERSARIES/EVENTS in ART HISTORY in 2024:
• Anselm Adornes 600 [ancestor of 17 generations, Bruges Domein]
• Mission San Antonio de Valero (The Alamo) 300
• Caspar David Friedrich 250 Watch for special events celebrating this remarkable early 19th-century landscape painter (focus of Art inSight study tour to Berlin in 2015); Hamburg Kunsthalle exhibition . . . Dresden, Berlin
• National Gallery London 200
• Lafayette's "Farewell" Tour of the US 200 [excellent article and schedule of 2024 events in July/August American Spirit DAR Magazine] • Impressionism 150 (1874 was the first year these independent artists exhibited together; they organized 7 further exhibitions, the last in 1886). Art inSight is celebrating this sesquicentennial in the 2024 lecture series, "Painters of Modern Life" (see schedule, above)
• Centenary of Surrealism
• St Martin in the Fields celebrates Neville Marriner 100
• Centenary of the California Palace of the Legion of Honor
• Centenary of the Texas State Parks System -- see exhibition, Albany TX in listing above
ATLANTAHigh Museum • https://high.org/Pioneers, Influencers, and Rising Voices: Women in the Collection (new installation)
Shaheen Collection of French Works (ongoing)
A family collection focused on French art of the late 19th and early 20th centuries BALTIMORE Baltimore Museum of Art • https://artbma.org/ The Art of Pattern: Henri Matisse and Japanese Woodcut Artists (June 2, 2024 - January 5, 2025) BARCELONA Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya • https://www.museunacional.cat/en BASEL Kunstmuseum Basel • www.kunstmuseumbasel.ch Fondation Beyeler • www.kunstmuseumbasel.ch BENTONVILLE Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art • crystalbridges.org including Frank Lloyd Wright's Bachman-Wilson House, 1957
BLOOMINGTON Eskenazi Museum of Art (Indiana University) • https://artmuseum.indiana.edu/ Blanche Hoschedé-Monet in the Light (February 14 - June 15, 2025)Step-daughter of Claude Monet BONN Bundestkunsthalle • www.bundeskunsthalle.de BOSTON Museum of Fine Arts Boston •www.mfa.org/Dali: Disruption and Devotion (July 6 - December 1, 2024)
BROOKLYN Brooklyn Museum of Art • brooklynmuseum.org The Dinner Party Today: Conversations on a Landmark Feminist Work: a new pocast . . . info here: https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/stories/the-dinner-party-today-judy-chicago
The first full-scale museum presentation in this country. Showing the full range of her achievement over her career, tragically cut short by a postpartum embolism, the display includes more than 50 paintings, 15 large-scale drawings, and five etchings.
French Neoclassical Paintings from The Horvitz Collection(–) 25 paintings from the preeminent private collection of French 18th-century art in the United States: The Horvitz Collection. The selection of works focuses on Neoclassicism, an artistic style that emerged in the later 1700s and flourished through the 1820s, a period of tremendous political and social upheaval in France. This time was also the heyday of “history painting,” a genre of painting characterized by large-scale compositions portraying scenes from history, mythology, and religion.
DRESDEN Albertinum and Kupferstich Kabinett • https://albertinum.skd.museum/ Caspar David Friderich: Where it all started (August 24, 2024 - January 5, 2025)
The German Romantic artist made many of his most impressive works in Dresden
FRANKFURTStädel Museum • Women Artists between Frankfurt and Paris around 1900 (through October 27, 2024) 26 undersung artists who helped shape European modernism GAINESVILLE Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art, University of Florida • harn.ufl.edu
Caspar David Friedrich: Transparent Moonlight (through December 31, 2024) part of the European celebration of the 250th birthday of this great German painter
500 years of women painters . . . No surprising verbiage, but the Brits finally getting to this point: yay!
Poster artist is Laura Knight in Cornwall (tour 2014, Great Women Artists 2023). includes Artemisia’s Self-Portrait as Pittura/Allegory of Painting, 1638 from Royal Collection
Exploring the Alps (November12, 2024 - April 27, 2025)
Organized around Giovanni Segantini’s monumental pastel Study for “La Vita” depicting the Alpine peaks that ringed his home in the Engadine Valley in Switzerland, this focused exhibition highlights the different ways in which later 19th-century artists explored and depicted the Alps. Themes include the joys and difficulties of working outdoors and the connections between the land and its inhabitants.
Caillebotte Painting Men (25 February to 25 May 2025)
Exhibition organized by Musée d'Orsay in observance of 130th anniversary of Caillebotte's death
Belle da Costa Greene: A Librarian's Legacy (Fall 2024)
Exhibition devoted to the story of Morgan's "personal librarian," who built the library collection and eventually directed the Library; subject of the acclaimed book by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray, The Personal Librarian, 2021 See video on website: "The Most Fascinating Librarian in American History"
Masterpieces from the Borghese Gallery (January 6, 2024 - January 5, 2025) 40 works on loan complement one of the best collections of Italian art in France
Exquisite collection of French XVIII art and furnishings assembled by Moise da Camondo in memory of his son, Nissim; the Camondo Family were neighbors of the Ephrussi Family close to Parc Monceau, the inspiration behind Edmund de Waal's Letters to Camondo
Gustave Caillebotte: Painting Men (October 8, 2024 - January 19, 2025) Special exhibition honoring the 130th anniversary of the death of this key figure of Impressionism; 70 paintings!
130 diverse works that follow the artist’s evolving practice and demonstrate her interest in the “serious work” of artmaking. The exhibition will present new findings about the materials she used and her processes—which were advanced for her era—as it coincides with a detailed technical study of the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s significant Cassatt holdings.
Mary Cassatt at Work is the first major showing of the artist’s oeuvre since 1998–99. By considering her professionalism, her biography, and the wider Parisian world she inhabited, a richer and more complex picture of Cassatt develops, inviting contemporary conversations about gender, work, and artistic agency.
Firing the Imagination: Japanese Influence on French Ceramics, 1880-1910 (through May 25, 2025)
From glazing techniques to iconography; be sure to look for Hokusai motifs on the tableware designed by Félix Bracquemond for production by Eugène Rousseau
Rodin Museum • rodinmuseum.orgRethinking the Modern Monument (ongoing) Applauded and despised in equal measure, Rodin’s public sculptures were viewed as a shocking departure from the methods used for centuries to pay homage to famous figures, and he changed the form forever. See many of the artist’s best-known sculptures alongside works by artists who came after, inspired by the radical intimacy of his public monuments. PLYMOUTH The Box • https://www.thebox PORTLAND (Maine) Portland Museum of Art • www.portlandmuseum.orgTours of the Winslow Homer studio at Prout's Neck:Available from April through October, twice a day, on select days of the week (207) 775-6148
SAINT-PAUL DE VENCEFondation Maeght • https://www.fondation-maeght.com/Bonnard-Matisse, A Friendship (through October 6, 2024)Special exhibition inaugurating new exhibition spaces in observance of the Foundations' 60th year. SALT LAKE CITY Utah Museum of Fine Arts • umfa.utah.edu
De Young/Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco • http://deyoung.famsf.org Tamara de Lempicka (October 12, 2024 - February 9, 2025) More than 150 works are brought together for the first major retrospective of the Polish artist in the United States Centenary celebrations of the Legion of Honor SAN JOSE
YERRES,FRANCE--new museum: La Propriété Caillebotte à Yerres • http://proprietecaillebotte.com/en/ Part of a nice long day SE of Paris: Yerres, Barbizon, Moret-sur-Loing, Vaux-le-Vicomte, Fontainebleau ZURICH Kunsthaus • https://www.kunsthaus.ch/
Art inSight Inc. f. 1995; website 2007 designed by Kathy Kelly; Last update: October 11, 2024
