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>>> And now an eight special
presentation.
In this edition of "Artbeat
Nation," exhibition bridges art
and fashion through history.
>> The dawn of modernism, met
the rise of the department
store and the advent of ready
to wear clothing.
>>> A photographer captures the
beauty of the American
southwest.
>> We're really always thinking
about this larger mystery --
>> Sculpture finds inspiration
in a long-ago era.
>> I don't tend to look at on
what's going around me, tend to
look back as far as influences
historically.
>>> And an artist gives
Caribbean art a new home.
>> The story of a lot of the
pieces here is the history of
the region.
>> It's all ahead on "Artbeat
Nation."
>> Funding for "Artbeat Nation"
is made possible by
contributions to eight from
viewers like you.
Thank you.
>>> They say art imitates life.
An exhibition at the
Metropolitan museum of art in
New York City proves just that.
Impressionism, fashion and
modernity, evolution of fashion
and art as portrayed by
impressionist master painters
including Monet and Degas.
Christine Ha guides us through
the exhibition.
>> Welcome.
Tonight we'll take a stroll
through 19th century Paris,
sophisticated style capital
where art and fashion go hand
in hand.
Examines the dialogue between
art and fashion through the
works of impressionist
painters.
Monet, Degas, Tissot, found
inspiration in the vibrant
culture of a city bubbling with
beauty and light.
The freshness of new fashion
trends proved to be an enticing
and significant subject for
these painters.
Seeking to capture the
subtleties of modern life.
Let's begin our journey through
impressionism, fashion, and
modernity.
The impressionists created a
romantic mood in their works
with attention to natural light
and stylized fresh strokes.
Portraits and common scenes of
nature and the every day were
the favorite subjects.
Contemporary dress played a
defining role in their
practice.
Monet said the latest fashion
is absolutely necessary for a
painting.
It's what matters most.
In the 1860s, newly rebuilt
Paris was the backdrop for
artists like Monet and Tissot.
Full-length large format
portraits, paintings with an
emphasis on style.
Painting the trends of the day
became a fresh way of -- modern
life.
Artists headed out of doors for
what's called Plein air
painting, the practice of
painting outside.
No where else were artists able
to capture the essence of
sunlight and shade.
In this setting, Parisian
summer fashions consist of
colorful dresses, delicate
embroidery, with a
light-hearted tableau of
picnics and leisure.
Visitors will have the pleasure
of seeing luncheon on the grass
on loan from the Musee d'Orsay
in Paris.
Shown together for the first
time in the U.S.
These exemplary paintings --
these impressionist works allow
us to escape to a life of
Parisian privilege and luxury.
Adorned in gorgeous high
fashion, depicted by artists
who navigated circles of
influential high society across
the urban landscape.
The exhibition continues with a
dynamic look at fashion and
painting in black and white.
>> The white dress exemplifies
the more informal garments,
paintings showing a more
relaxed and intimate side of
life.
White was considered an
appropriate choice to wear
around the home and preferred
choice for the summertime.
Here the ladies in white reveal
the artists familiar gaze, like
that of Berthe Morisot.
Little black dress as much a
staple then as it is now.
Gowns were flattering and
elegant.
Black was a sophisticated
wardrobe choice and it called
upon the utmost skill of the
artist's ability to capture
light and dark.
Poet Charles Baudelaire
described the term modernity.
As we travel into the 1880s,
the term impressionism is newly
coined to describe the style's
modern paintings.
It's not only the style and
movement of light brushstrokes
across the canvas,
impressionism refers to the way
compositions of daily life are
artfully rendered.
During this period, dresses
begin to lose the fuller form
of earlier years.
And their silhouettes become
whittled -- fashion continues
to play a pivotal role in the
paintings set amongst the
backdrops of Paris.
Central to this exhibition, the
painting, in the conservatory,
the actual dress worn by the
artist's wife.
Summer dress features precise
tailoring, pleats, details
skillfully depicted.
The designer is unknown of the
dress, many of the
trend-setting designs of this
era are from the high
fashion -- Charles Frederick
Worth -- known for his use of
lavish fabrics and stunning
detail.
Men's wear was also well
represented in the paintings of
the impressionists.
Styles -- the men of Paris took
special care to dress for both
day and night.
Accessories like top hats and
canes signified a mark of
individuality.
For fashion, the dawn of
modernism met the rise of the
department store and advent of
ready to wear clothing.
Degas series, milliner, and
Tissot's the shop girl,
consumer and artist, new way
of -- depict portrayals with
their brushes, accessories like
corsets, hats, and slippers
call to mind window shopping on
this piece of Paris.
We leave the exhibition with
the look at the elegant urban
settings integral to the scenes
of modern fashionable life.
City and the elegant location,
like a ball room, or the
theater, or places to see or be
seen.
And a la mode, rainy
boulevards, to sunny parks.
The impressionist era
emphasized light and life.
Painters and designers were
eager to communicate --
reflecting the trends.
Impressionism, fashion,
modernity, rich complexion of
an exhibition giving us a
chance to admire this chic era
of fashion and art.
>> To find out more about this
and other exhibitions,
metmuseum.org.
>> In the midst of the American
southwest landscape,
photographer Michael Berman
thrives to capture the beauty
of the natural world.
Berman's focus stems from its
fascination with the
relationship between people and
mother nature.
The land and especially the
American western landscape has
something that is really hard
to find.
That space to go off alone.
And I -- I think that allows
you to have a -- both an inner
dialogue as well as a dialogue
that is relevant to the larger
community.
And it really is an amazing
thing to be able to drive down
the road, come -- drive through
the gate, get out of the truck,
and keep walking.
People have ways of
understanding the bigger
things.
And we do that with symbolic
systems.
We're really always thinking
about this larger mysteries of
what's important and how do we
connect to that?
In terms of the land, this --
ways of defining how we're
seeing the landscape.
And really in a contemporary
world, humans have this
incredible capacity to view
things and interpret the
world's values to what we can
use.
And right now, science is the
ultimate affirmation of that.
You'll find any issue of land
use.
Whether it is fire, water, the
ecosystem.
Always this idea of well, we
can figure this out to the
science and management.
And actually I look at it
another way.
Many of the great problems
we're facing.
Fire, you know, introduce
species, actually somebody who
thought they could figure it
all out in a simple way and
they apply a simple solution.
Yet there is the bigger complex
systems.
Art is really a way, aesthetics
is a way of getting beyond the
idea that I can reduce it to
small things, but then I can
look at the whole and admit
that I don't understand it but
actually begin to see both its
manifest structure, as well as
inherent values.
>> Gila is kind of an amazing
place in that many concepts
that people assume everybody
knows and understands, actually
emerged in a Gila, a place that
still teaches.
The time I've learned how to
see a landscape, the Gila is
one of the last -- the last
truly wild forests that's left
on the planet.
And especially the Ponderosa.
Large yellow pine forest.
It still is a complex ecosystem
that is -- it's working.
And by working, what I mean is
that if you leave it alone, if
humans don't interact with it,
it has a dimensional
complexity.
>>> For me, photography is a
way of finishing a
relationship.
And I often find that there is
a long period of time where I
like to look at things.
Looking closely -- I like to
think that at some point in
time I make photograph, because
I feel it's important to make
those photographs.
As an artist, one has to find
something outside oneself that
is more important.
If you look at the tradition of
landscape photography, and
especially in the American
west, which is really one of
the iconic places where people
go to make photographs, often
what you have is people
imposing a vision on it that
they already know, understand,
or believe in, and I actually
think that our understanding of
the land has to evolve beyond
that.
What ended up happening is when
we think about saving a
landscape, we have to have the
cathedral forest, the canyon,
or we have to have this
pristine landscape, and what it
turns out is that many of these
ecosystems, I like to use the
word scragely, not this wow, I
have to stand on the edge of
this and get the IMAX going.
They're very subtle.
They can be quite wonderful to
dwell within.
And that if you spend time, you
know, it will begin to see the
beauty and I think a gift like
that is the same gift as, you
know, the greatest literature
or philosophy or art, is the
ability to come to the world
anew and see it -- its manifest
beauty.
>> What photography allows you
to do is this amazing look at
the land, look at places.
I don't have the patience or
interest to make a certain kind
of landscape photograph.
But I love looking at things.
And so rather than try and make
something that really, you
know, is -- is this kind of
grand landscape, which I don't
really enjoy or have the
patience for quite that much
anymore, is the more subtle
things that I just find amazing
is what my works becomes about.
When you ask an artist about
what they hope to achieve with
their work is sometimes you can
say achieving means, you know,
making the history books.
Being considered an important
artist.
Rather than my work being
saved, I would much rather see
some of these places be saved.
I don't think my work is
significant at all.
I think these places are.
>> To find out more about
Michael Berman, visit
fragmentedimages.com.
>> Sculpt or Gary Weisman molds
bronze and clay into
large-scale figures that
channel the art of ancient
Greece and Italy.
He takes us into his workshop
to show us how he makes his
grand sculptures.
\M\M
>> My name is Gary Weisman, and
I make classical bronze
sculptures.
They're very traditional.
Greeks are a very big influence
and also the Italian
renaissance.
I don't tend to look at what's
going around me, I tend to look
back in terms of influences
historically.
We traveled to Italy, oh, maybe
once a year for about three
weeks and we draw extensively,
nonstop.
The influences -- my main
energies are going to be on --
I think there is, as far as
public collections go, museums,
outdoor situations, the nude
is blocked in this country.
You see a lot in Europe.
I don't know how contemporary.
I've been doing cantilevered
life size pieces, maxing out
the possibilities
architecturally of what bronze
structures do.
So they will completely hover
horizontally with no supports.
What I'm working on now are
female crucifixes.
I don't really know why.
The pieces have become a lot
more narrative now, so that's
kind of exciting.
I'm sorry they're so tortured
now.
You have to listen to these
things.
Working on an empowered pieces
which are based on Greek heroes
with weapons.
It's kind of tricky business.
It's very stressful.
I started doing this in the
mid-70s.
When I do the pours, I'll pour
1,500 to 2,000 pounds in a day
or so.
During a pour, I have my
ex-students come up from the
Pennsylvania academy in
Philadelphia.
There's a rapport I have with
the metal.
Would I do these things if they
didn't sell?
Yeah, I would.
I think it's critical for me to
stay in a place of not knowing.
I don't know.
And finding an experiential
connect to it through some --
that will hold my intensity of
focus.
Writing a story, I don't have a
finite fixed ending.
It's an evolution.
>> To find out more, visit
garyweisman.net.
>> Sacramento artist combs the
Caribbean for unique art and
adds her own touch?
Rob Stewart gives us a look.
>> We're celebrating the world
of art today at the Kuumba
Collective Art Gallery in
Sacramento with Sacramento
artist Adele James.
>> Thank you for coming to
Kuumba.
>> Beautiful place here.
What I love about your work,
you've teamed up with an
artist, and you capture his art
and you bring it to America and
give it a whole new life.
Tell me about that.
>> Well, I was inspired by the
work of a folk artist in
Trinidad and TOBAGO.
This idea of Caribbean art
promotion, as a way to promote
and bring awareness to folk art
of the Caribbean, and it is a
collaborative effort.
What I do is I photograph the
work, but also photograph
different images that -- to
create these pieces and then
when the items are sold, share
the profits with the artist.
But it also helps create a new
form of the work.
Glaze, I put the work on
different items from functional
art baskets, thinking about
work that is affordable, that's
functional, and that is also
beautiful, and at the same
time, it shares the culture and
the history of the Caribbean.
>> Interesting.
>> And to think about how can
these artists be supported in
continuing to do what they do
and also creating other forms
that can extend the value of
the work.
>> Where do you get your
inspiration from?
>> You know, I think that --
for me when I look at the
pieces, they tell a story.
And the story of a lot of the
pieces shares the history of
the region.
>> And it's getting the artist
in Trinidad new life here in
America.
>> It is a collaborative
effort.
For me, that's how I like to
work.
>> You're a new artist.
You've been doing this about a
year, correct?
>> Yes.
>> What does it mean to you to
have a piece in the Crocker
within one year?
>> It is overwhelming.
The total journey has been
overwhelming.
So, from coming to Kuumba, and
having them say we want you to
show your work here, to doing
the second Saturday's and then
the Crocker, I have to believe
that it's not about me, but
that, you know, this is some of
the roles I am meant to play to
help bring attention to this
work and I get excited about
doing it as well.
>> I can tell.
And it's beautiful work.
It is beautiful art, Adele.
And we thank you for sharing
your story with us today.
Adele James, Sacramento, Kuumba
Collective Art Gallery.
Visit the Kuumba Collective Art
Gallery Facebook page to find
out more.
>> For more arts and culture,
visit azpbs.org/artbeat, where
you'll find featured videos and
information on the Arizona arts
scene.
Funding for "Artbeat Nation"
was made possible by
contributions to eight from
viewers like you.
Thank you.
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