This story was originally published on DenverPost.com on Nov. 1, 2004.
Don’t expect a bevy of masterworks by Claude Monet, Vincent Van
Gogh or Rembrandt van Rijn when the Denver Art Museum opens its
$90.5 million addition in the fall of 2006.
Instead of trying to dazzle visitors with big-time touring
exhibitions, the museum wants to keep the focus on what it hopes
will be the biggest blockbuster of all – Daniel Libeskind’s
much-anticipated building.
“That’s really where we want people to spend their time – looking
at this building, looking at how the collections are shown in the
building. That’s really the excitement,” said deputy director
Cindy Ford.
The three debut exhibitions, scheduled to be announced today, will
showcase collections that have been recently donated or are on
long-term loan to the insitution and have been little seen.
In 1999, when museum leaders sought voter approval for a $62.5
million bond issue to support the construction project, they vowed
that the new structure would provide a home for parts of the
permanent collection that could not be exhibited for lack of
space.
Ford said that these shows, culled from three museum departments,
deliver on that promise. Museumgoers who expected the addition to usher in a new era of
top-flight traveling exhibitions will not be disappointed, she
said. But such offerings will begin only after this opening trio of
exhibitions, which will remain on view about a year. The lineup: An exhibition, divided into two rotations, will provide Denver’s
first comprehensive look at world-class Japanese art on long-term
loan from Kimiko Powers of Carbondale, who assembled the collection
with her late husband, John.
“It’s one of the finest private collections of Japanese art, and
it’s one that has not generally been available for the public to
see,” said Ron Otsuka, curator of Asian art.
Hanging and hand scrolls from the 8th-19th centuries will be the
main features.
In 2002, nationally known art collectors Kent and Vicki Logan of Vail donated 213 artworks from the 1980s and ’90s by such major artists as James Rosenquist, Bruce Nauman and Francesco Clemente.
A few dozen selections from that gift were included in 2003-04 in
“Full Frontal: Contemporary Asian Art from the Logan Collection”
and an earlier show.
This survey will go much further. It will offer an array of
highlights plus works the Logans have given to the San Francisco
Museum of Modern Art and others that remain part of their
holdings.
The museum significantly boosted its holding of contemporary
Native American art earlier this year with the donation of 320 pieces by Virginia Mattern of Stamford, Conn.
“Probably 90 percent of the finest artists working over the last
10 years are represented,” Nancy Blomberg, curator of native arts,
said at the time.
About 15 of the works have been on display in the museum’s American
Indian galleries, but this offering will bring together more than
200 selections for the first time.
Fine arts critic Kyle MacMillan can be reached at 303-820-1675 or kmacmillan @denverpost.com.
This story was originally published on DenverPost.com on Nov. 1, 2004.
