Kansas City #9 - The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art

[James Bond Agent 007]

OK I'm in the new Bloch gallery right now. It's quite impressive! This is easily a collection you'd expect to see in a much bigger city like NY or Chicago. They've got 4 Monets (including Waterlillies), 2 Degas's, 3 Renoirs, 3 Manets, 4 Gaugans, 5 Pissaros, 2 Van Gogh's, 3 Cezannes, 2 or 3 Sisleys, about the same number of Kandinskys, 2 Picassos and a lot more.

Pics later.

[mousquet]

France's public museums are selfish and sort of retarded IMO. They should share a lot more with these in America in exchange for contemporary art that's been a bit more lively over there. NYC is the major spot of modern culture nowadays.

Some aroused my curiosity about contemporary things here, then I'm hurt when I see many locals can't understand yet. Contemporary art actually seems about mere meaning, much more than about so-called aesthetics as usually accepted, which must be even bigger. It's truly insolent, breaking usual codes.

The local rich over here in Paris seize many of the valuable contemporary pieces for their private collections. I guess there's a serious reason for that. The greedy rich are often aware of many things we don't know yet, cause they won't share... That's nasty.

[James Bond Agent 007]

Speaking of contemporary art, after I finished at the Nelson-Atkins museum I wandered a couple blocks over to the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art. It's a small museum but kinda interesting. Took some pics there, too, which I'll post here.

[pico44]

Originally Posted by woodrow

Lovely pics. But none of the Bloch Building!

The Nelson-Atkins is actually one of the best encyclopedic museums in the country. It is really the greatest treasure of the city.

Couple small, school-marmish things. I apologize if my tone gets a little pedantic-

The Asian collections are among the very best in the US.
The Chinese painting collection is one of the most important outside of Asia. The jade collection has one of the most revered Chinese carvings anywhere - http://www.nelson-atkins.org/art/col...-carousel-2520 There is a sculpture - Guanyin of the Southern Sea, that is so beautiful that it can bring you to tears

The Japanese galleries are closed and being renovated as I type. Not the best collection, though the screens are quite nice.

Regarding the pic that you captioned "This is a gallery they were redoing" - that is part of the Bloch Galleries, a total gut job of the entire NE corner of the first floor. It is a $25 million+ rebuild of the galleries which contain European art from 1750-1945 - http://www.nelson-atkins.org/art/exh...och-galleries/. The money, along with 29 new pieces added to the already strong collection, has taken the collection from very good to great. Thanks to Henry Bloch of H&R Bloch. So please don't say "They even have a Van Gogh." It minimizes the collection, which includes multiple Van Gogh's, multiple Monet's, multiple Cezanne's, Degas' etc. etc.

As far as other European art, the museum has one of the VERY FEW Caravaggios in the US, a very important Petrus Christus, high quality Hals and Rembrandt. It's collection of Northern Renaissance art generally is really excellent and can give a patron a very good understanding of what was happening 1400-1650 in the North of Europe. Also, very good Spanish art, esp of 1400 and 1500's.

The American Indian art collection is quite good with some astounding pieces. The Nelson is one of the few art museums to have a dedicated curator for the arts of Native Americans, and look at pieces from a art history, rather than a ethnographic lens.

The American art collection is VERY strong, especially 19th century, as well as the Bentons.

The photography collection. Again, extraordinary, amongst the best largely through the gift and purchase of the Hallmark Photographic Collection.

The museum is decent in Modern art, with some very fine works by Kline, de Kooning, and Motherwell. Also, a entire collection of Noguchi scultpures. The contemporary is good, and getting better (they have to get around Nelson's rule restricting purchasing art from living artists).
Lots more - African is quite good. These are all in the Bloch Building (Henry has been very generous), a spectacular building designed by Stephen Holl - http://www.archdaily.com/4369/the-ne...oll-architects

The sculpture park is fabulous. Gorgeous grounds designed by Dan Kiley and a really top-notch collection. Beautiful

The museum's ancient and pre-Columbian are ehh... and there is always room to add more.

I could go on and on; about the decorative arts collection, pottery. etc.etc. I haven't lived in KC for decades, but I go there every time I visit. It had a huge impact on me when I was a child.

If you go to KC, go to the Nelson-Atkins Museum

I love this post!

The Nelson Atkins Museum of Art is an absolute jewel. Guanyin of the Southern Seas is the greatest piece of Chinese art I have ever seen. Let me restate that, it is one of the greatest pieces of art I have ever seen in my life. And I say this confidently after multiple visits to the life-changing exhibit of early Chinese art at the metropolitan museum on view right now. And the genius of Caravaggio is on full display with his St John the Baptist. It is one of his very best paintings, period. Any other museum in the world would kill to have it. A great Monet. A wonderful little El Greco. A collection of the great American artist, Thomas Hart Benton. A great Egyptian pharaoh bust from the Middle Kingdom. And a superb, albeit small collection of the most important modern masters housed in one of the two or three most important pieces of American architecture built in the last twenty years.

It is reason enough, all by itself, to visit Kansas City.

[James Bond Agent 007]

After several days' delay here are the pics of the Bloch gallery.

Sign next to one entry into the Bloch Galleries



And this is the other entrance



Somebody didn't finish something



Lots of people liked this one. It was really big.



I have no idea how they made these things back then. If they were actual paintings they were teeny-tiny ones.

[James Bond Agent 007]

Arab horsemen by a German painter



Meow.



Gallery scene



Monet



Monet. I can't tell you how many times when tying Monet I accidentally type Money.

[James Bond Agent 007]

Pissaro



I forget who this was.



Manet



Pissarro



Monet

[James Bond Agent 007]

Renoir



Manet



Monet - Water Lillies. It was really big.



Caption



Van Gogh



Caption

[James Bond Agent 007]

This was the other Van Gogh I showed before. It had been in a hallway but they moved it to the new gallery. So I took a close-up.



Caption



The one at the top is really famous



Pissarro

[James Bond Agent 007]

Gaugan





Gaugan



Degas

[James Bond Agent 007]

Gallery scene. This looks into the section with 20th century art.



Same room, different angle



Kandinsky



Picasso

[James Bond Agent 007]

Miro



One of Gaugan's more modern pieces



Picasso



Kandinsky



The poor bunny rabbit

[James Bond Agent 007]

Later I went back to the other galleries and took a few more pictures. Looking at many of the Renaissance (and before) ones, it's always interesting to see how, in many cases, they don't have the proportions right, or haven't developed perspective correctly, and so on. This one is a case in point: The details are really good, but it seems like they took a couple centuries or so to get proportions correct. Notice how small the heads are, and the dogs look too small. When I see stuff like this I wonder how the artists (and those who critiqued them at the time) could not have noticed it? You just look at the heads and dogs and it just looks wrong. In particular, I often notice they have childrens' heads too small. It doesn't seem like it would have been difficult to figure out why it doesn't look right, but in spite of that seeming condition, it seems like it took a long time before they figured it out.

[James Bond Agent 007]

Originally Posted by woodrow

There is a sculpture - Guanyin of the Southern Sea, that is so beautiful that it can bring you to tears

I got a far-away shot of it on the previous page, but since you mentioned it I decided to take a close-up shot.

[montréaliste]

Both museums have great collections. Your comment about perspecfive, proportions and likenesses is fair. Some artists were very strong in acute portraiture like Hans Holbein the Younger before perspective became established in the Art of Northern Europe. There is a slow evolution towards photographic depictions in painting. In the early 19th century, just look at some idealized portraiture before the event of photography and it.is striking how different the Art that came before and after. Compare Ingres or Delacroix to Manet and Degas for instance.

[mousquet]

Picasso's funny work always reminds me that not being any educated "intello", I'll always need a patient guide or something like headphones playing synchronized comments to help me interpret and appreciate every piece. Same goes to older classical stuff anyway.

I guess art is much like philosophical or religious fictions in that respect. If you never attended any related education, you can't really get it on your own. Then you simply need some help by those who know to enlighten you a little bit.

[SymphonicPoet]

I think the Kiefer might be an example of the "deceptive narrator" phenomenon.

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

Given the rest of Kiefer's work . . . I don't really think that's about star fields. That one haunted me when I was there. (But I've always been a fan of his "Breaking the Vessels." And maybe the narration there was a little less oblique. The content still feels similar, somehow.)

Anyway, lovely stuff. Always a fun visit. And yes, I loved the new wing.

[James Bond Agent 007]

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

Speaking of contemporary art, after I finished at the Nelson-Atkins museum I wandered a couple blocks over to the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art. It's a small museum but kinda interesting. Took some pics there, too, which I'll post here.

At long last here are the pics of the Kemper Museum. It's a small museum a few blocks away from Nelson-Atkins, but if you're into the modern art thing it's worth a visit. Plus it's got a neat little cafe.

From the outside



This came out fuzzy, but oh well.



Lobby



And another view of the lobby looking toward the gift shop



Inside the gift shop



You can buy yourself a Chihuly ...



... if you've got several thousand kicking around



More ...

[James Bond Agent 007]

Another view of the main corridor



Cafe view 1



Cafe view 2



Cafe view 3



Cafe view 4


More ...

[James Bond Agent 007]

Now onto the artworks. First few are in the main hallway.

I didn't pay attention to what this was named, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was named "Blue."



This pic doesn't quite do it justice, but this was actually a pretty cool photo.



One of the galleries,

r

This was OK. Aside from the Chihuly in the gift shop, I hadn't heard of any of these artists. Maybe someday some of them will be famous.



Pretty colors.



I could do this.



More ...