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Katrin Sigurdardottir at the Met is an exhibition of two new sculptural installations created specifically for the Metropolitan by Sigurdardottir, an Icelandic artist (born in 1967), who lives and works in New York City and Reykjavik. Sigurdardottir is known for her highly detailed renditions of places, both real and fictional, that often incorporate an element of surprise.
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The 1910s—a period remembered for "The Great War," Einstein's theory of relativity, the Russian Revolution, and the birth of Hollywood—was a dynamic and tumultuous decade that ushered in the modern era. This new age—as it was captured by the quintessentially modern art of photography—will be the subject of the exhibition
"Our Future Is In The Air": Photographs from the 1910s, on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art from November 10, 2010, through April 10, 2011.
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For the first time in more than 25 years, The Metropolitan Museum of Art will display five of its original Autochromes by Edward Steichen and Alfred Stieglitz for one week only—January 25-30, 2011—as part of the current exhibition Stieglitz, Steichen, Strand. Invented by Auguste and Louis Lumière in 1907, Autochromes are one-of-a-kind color transparencies that are seductively beautiful when backlit.
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Filippino Lippi (1457-1504) is one of the great artists of 15th-century Florence. Among his principal patrons was the wealthy banker Filippo Strozzi (1428–1491), who in 1487 contracted the artist to decorate his funerary chapel in Santa Maria Novella with an outstanding cycle of frescoes. Around the same time, Strozzi also commissioned a Madonna and Child for his villa at Santuccio, west of the city. This work was acquired from the Duveen firm in 1928 by Jules Bache and was bequeathed to the Metropolitan Museum in 1949. In preparation for an exhibition on the artist that will be held in Rome next year, the picture was taken to conservation for examination this fall. A test cleaning revealed that beneath a thick, discolored varnish there was a beautifully preserved, richly colored painting. It emerged that the varnish had been artificially toned to create an almost monochromatic appearance—an amber-colored uniformity that conformed to the idea of how an Old Master should appear. So striking is the transformation that the picture seems a new acquisition.
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Thinking Outside the Box: European Cabinets, Caskets, and Cases from the Permanent Collection (1500–1900)—on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art beginning December 7, 2010— will feature 100 works selected from the Museum's Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts. The objects featured in this installation will range from strongboxes to travel cases and from containers for tea or tobacco to storage boxes for toiletries or silverware. These lidded pieces, some of which have not been on display for many years, are made in a large variety of shapes and sizes, and of many different materials, and were created by mostly unknown artists, craftsmen, and amateurs. Viewed together, these works reflect changes in social customs as well as the evolution of styles over four centuries. Many are precious works of art that were collected in their own right.
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The Metropolitan Museum of Art holds the most important collection of paintings in America by the celebrated Dutch artist Frans Hals (1582/83-1666), whose portraits and genre scenes were famous in his lifetime for their immediacy and dazzling brushwork. Frans Hals in the Metropolitan Museum —on view from July 26, through October 10, 2011—will present 13 paintings by Hals, including two lent from private collections, and several works by other Netherlandish masters.
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Astonishing archaeological discoveries made during the extraordinarily successful excavations of Heinrich Schliemann at the ancient Greek site of Mycenae in 1876 and of Sir Arthur Evans at Knossos on Crete, beginning in 1900, stirred popular interest in archaeology in the early 20th century and helped create a demand among museums and private collectors for high-quality replicas of antiquities from the newly identified Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations. Opening May 17 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Historic Images of the Greek Bronze Age: The Reproductions of E. Gilliéron & Son focuses on the work of Swiss-born Émile Gilliéron (1850–1924) and his son—also named Émile (1885–1939)—who were among the foremost art restorers of their time. Their work influenced the study of Aegean art and was integral to its widespread introduction throughout Europe and America.
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