Ellsworth Kelly @ Peder Lund, Oslo - "Postcards"

Ellsworth Kelly: Postcards

Peder Lund, Oslo

September 30 – 16 December 2023

Peder Lund takes part in the centennial celebration of the inimitable American artist ELLSWORTH KELLY (1923-2015). With the exhibition “Ellsworth Kelly: Postcards”, Peder Lund presents an exclusive selection of the artist’s beloved and important production of postcard collages.

On what would have been the artist’s 100th birthday, a year-long celebration showcases the artist’s indelible legacy. This collaborative event includes exhibitions at several museums and galleries across the U.S. and Europe. Peder Lund hosts a unique presentation in concert with the Ellsworth Kelly Foundation and its president Jack Shear, as the artist estate’s representative gallery in Scandinavia.

Ellsworth Kelly is considered to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century. His abstract paintings, sculptures, and prints are masterworks in the exploration of line, form, and color. Presented at Peder Lund, for the first time in Scandinavia, are twenty- two of Kelly's delightful postcard collages — private studies that brim with anarchic humor, surrealistic juxtapositions, and formal virtuosity. Some of these miniature masterpieces served as exploratory musings by the artist while others were used as preparation for larger works in other media. From 1949 to 2005, Kelly made just over 400 postcard works. These show a playful, unbounded space of creative freedom for the artist and provide an important insight into the way Kelly saw, experienced, and translated the world in his art.

As part of the Ellsworth Kelly Centennial Celebration program, major solo exhibitions are being dedicated to the artist by renowned institutions such as The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Glenstone Museum, Potomac; Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris and the Art Institute of Chicago.

ELLSWORTH KELLY ’s works are owned by many of the major artistic institutions of Western Europe and America, including the Reina Sofia, Madrid; the Tate Modern, London; the Centre Pompidou, Paris; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., and many others. Additionally, he created numerous important artworks for public spaces. During his lifetime, Kelly was honored with several awards, including the Praemium Imperiale award for painting, which he received in 2000 from the Japan Art Association, the title of Commandeur des Arts des Lettres, which he received in 2009 by the French government and, in 2013, the National Medal of Arts, presented by President Barack Obama.

PEDER LUND GALLERY

Tjuvholmen allé 27, 0252 Oslo

pederlund.no

Point, Line, Plane: The William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee Bequest @ Dallas Museum of Art

Point, Line, Plane: The William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee Bequest

Dallas Museum of Art 

September 26, 2021 – January 9, 2022

Edgar Degas

Seated Male Nude (recto), 1856-1858 

Pencil on paper

Dallas Museum of Art 

Bequest of William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee, 2019.72.21.A-B 

Berthe Morisot 

Harbor Scene (Isle of Wight), 1880

Watercolor on paper 

Dallas Museum of Art 

Bequest of William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee, 2019.72.39

Rosa Bonheur 

Pattes de lion, 1880-1885 

Black crayon on medium-weight wove paper with stumping 

Dallas Museum of Art 

Bequest of William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee, 2019.72.5 

At the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA), an exhibition honors a remarkable gift from the estate of distinguished scholar William B. Jordan and his husband, Robert Dean Brownlee. Celebrating the establishment of the Museum’s Works on Paper Department, Point, Line, Plane: The William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee Bequest is composed of approximately 50 works donated to the DMA by Jordan and Brownlee. The exhibition includes drawings, watercolors, prints, photography, sculpture, and decorative arts by some of the most important European and American artists of the past three centuries. Point, Line, Plane is curated by Sue Canterbury, The Pauline Gill Sullivan Curator of American Art and Interim Allen and Kelli Questrom Curator of Works on Paper.

“Bill and Robert were kind, intelligent, and generous souls, invested in creating a lasting impact on the arts in North Texas and at the DMA,” said Dr. Agustín Arteaga, the DMA’s Eugene McDermott Director. “Together they built a wonderful personal collection that shows their admiration for the unique intimacy contained in works on paper. We were honored to be recipients of their generosity, and we pay tribute to their mission by sharing these treasured works with our visitors."

Adolf Hiremy-Hirschl

Head of a Young Woman, 1890s

Black and white chalk on brown paper 

Dallas Museum of Art 

Bequest of William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee, 2019.72.29

Jean–Baptiste Camille Corot 

Paysage, n.d.

Charcoal on paper

Dallas Museum of Art

Bequest of William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee, 2019.72.15

Jordan and Brownlee were key figures in the arts community of Dallas–Fort Worth. While Brownlee’s focus was architecture and interior design, Jordan was a scholar and connoisseur of Spanish paintings. His influence on the region’s arts institutions is immeasurable. Serving as the founding director of the Meadows Museum (1967–1980) and as deputy director of the Kimbell Art Museum (1981–1990), Jordan raised the quality and profile of both collections. He began his affiliation with the DMA as an adjunct curator for European art (1977–1982) and evolved to become an invaluable member of the Museum’s Board of Trustees.

Both deeply interested in art, the couple assembled a collection over decades that included works by Paul Cézanne, Edgar Degas, Rosa Bonheur, Berthe Morisot, Auguste Rodin, Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Salvador Dalí, Jackson Pollock, Josef Albers, Cy Twombly, Ellsworth Kelly, and Robert Rauschenberg, among others. While the collection varied in types of objects and historical eras, works on paper were at its core. Point, Line Plane features approximately 50 works spanning the ancient to the contemporary, demonstrating an enduring fascination with artists’ use of expressive line, the depiction of the figure, and dialogues across media.

Robert Rauschenberg 

Autobiography: three works, 1968

Offset lithographs on paper

Dallas Museum of Art

Bequest of William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee, 2019.72.45.A-C, 

© Robert Rauschenberg Foundation. 

Image courtesy of the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation

Ellsworth Kelly 

Untitled, 2001 

Single-color lithograph 

Dallas Museum of Art

Bequest of William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee, 2019.72.31

© Ellsworth Kelly Foundation, Courtesy Matthew Marks Gallery

“While Bill and Robert collected across several media, it is apparent they appreciated drawings in particular for their immediacy as visible revelations of an artist’s initial concept. It is extraordinarily intimate in that it’s akin to witnessing the birth of the creative spark, no matter how long ago that moment took place,” said curator Sue Canterbury.

The DMA’s Works on Paper Department was established in 2019 through a group of visionary gifts to the Museum: a gift from the estate of Jordan and Brownlee, which provided significant funds to establish The William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee Endowment to support the department; the creation of a new, endowed curatorial position, The Allen and Kelli Questrom Curator of Works on Paper, made possible through an extraordinary $3 million bequest to the Museum by Allen and Kelli Questrom; and Jordan’s and Brownlee’s donation of nearly 80 works to the Museum, including 58 works on paper as well as antiquities, 20th-century furniture, 19th-century oil paintings, ceramics, sculpture, and silver.

Point, Line, Plane: The William B. Jordan and Robert Dean Brownlee Bequest is organized by the Dallas Museum of Art. 

DALLAS MUSEUM OF ART - DMA

1717 North Harwood, Dallas, Texas 75201

dma.org