(An Appropriate Distance)

 

FROM THE MAYOR'S DOORSTEP

I really liked the display at The Art Show this year of Oscar Bluemner's work by Menconi + Schoelkopf. But, like last year's show by this same gallery of John Marin, it turns out that The Art Show booth was only a smaller prelude to a much larger show of Bluemner's work held after The Art Show closed and back at the gallery's headquarters on the Upper East Side. So I held my fire until I could see the larger gallery show, and found a delicious entertainment that I can highly recommend.

 

Titled "Bluemner and the Critics,"it' s on through December 17 and has a catalogue by Roberta Smith Favis – who is not to be confused with the New York Times critic of nearly the same name, but is instead a longtime professor at Stetson University in Florida, and first curator of the fabulous Bluemner collection given to Stetson by the artist's daughter Vera Kouba. Read More 

The Montclair Art Museum is an easy commute. The De Camp Bus lines’ #33 route from Port Authority decants you on the doorstep of the museum in only 40 minutes or so, and the museum has long had a reputation for exhibitions that match the ambition – if not the scale – of Manhattan’ s museums. A year or so ago, I vastly enjoyed its presentation of “Cézanne in America,” and this time, I looked forward to seeing two new shows: “The New Spirit: American Art in the Armory Show, 1913” and “Oscar Bluemner’s America: Picturing Paterson, New Jersey” (both, alas, closed June 16). Read More