Fine Art Connoisseur January/February 2024

From time to time, we read of a person who discovered something important by accident. I seem to recall a woman finding a painting by the dumpster that turned out to be priceless. Stories like hers are rare, yet possible, and our contributing writer Daniel Grant offers more examples in his intriguing article (“Dumb Luck, or…?”) on page 67. I’ve had a few experiences of my own in this arena. My wife and I love to kill time at antique shows, and, though most exhibitors research their inventory in advance, sometimes we’ll find a darkened corner of a stand and look at each other in disbelief. “Is this really what we think it is? It must be a fake. It’s cheap. Let’s get it.” Treasures are relative, of course. Sometimes…

In Washington, D.C., this October, the National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) reopened after a two-year renovation of its historic building. When I first learned of its plans to close, I winced because I clearly remember visiting during its inaugural year — 1987. That was 37 years ago! Even though I had grown up around art museums (my late mother worked at the Smithsonian Institution and National Gallery of Art), I remember marveling over many female artists I had never even heard of. Back then, some critics thought the museum’s founder, Wilhemina Cole Holladay (1922– 2021), was consigning female artists to a kind of “ghetto,” and that she should have donated her core collection to an existing museum where the public could see them alongside their male counterparts.…

In a world obsessed with the next big thing, POLINA BARSKAYA (b. 1984) dares to reclaim the dignity of the ordinary. Her intimate, diaristic explorations of family life examine and elevate the small moments that make up our everyday lives, challenging the Instagram-centric notions of presentability that prevail in modern society. Born in Cherkassy, Ukraine, Barskaya has spent most of her life in Brooklyn’s Brighton Beach neighborhood. From an early age, visiting museums was a regular part of Barskaya’s life, as was calling herself an artist. She made her calling official as an adult by earning a B.A. in art from Hunter College and then an M.F.A. from Pratt Institute’s School of Design. Barskaya based her early paintings on photographs taken by family members but soon began taking her own photos…

TODAY'S MASTERS 2024 promises to be a good year for Gabriela Gonzalez Dellosso (b. 1968), who makes art that — once seen — is not easily forgotten. Flor ida’s Museum of Art–DeLand, located 45 min utes northeast of Orlando, is set to unveil The Paintings of Gabriela Gonzalez Dellosso: A Retrospective, on view there January 12–March 30. It features 52 works, some of which the artist has not seen in 20 years; a slightly larger version will open at Indiana’s Fort Wayne Museum of Art on April 20, running through July 14. Both presentations will — as the title sug gests — offer an opportunity to look back over Dellosso’s career at its midpoint, and it will also reveal some of her latest creations, including a large, complex painting that…

TODAY'S MASTERS Look up toward the sky, or out of your window. Chances are good you will spy a bird soon enough. Though some humans share their homes with birds, all people are surrounded by these feathered creatures; without them, our world would be a quieter, duller place. In this portfolio, we highlight the broad array of birds depicted by a flock of artists in recent years. Some of these images transcend mere description or charm to underscore the more profound, even symbolist, meanings we humans have assigned to birds over the centuries. An ideal place to appreciate the beauty and diversity of our feathered friends is the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in Wausau, Wisconsin. Every autumn, this institution presents its Birds in Art exhibition, which features the creations…

HISTORIC MASTERS DIGITAL CONTENT In northwestern Manhattan — an area many tourists never reach — an ever-growing number of informed art lovers are beating a path to Audubon Terrace, the impressive quadrangle of cultural institutions erected early in the 20th century through the generosity of the scholar-philanthropist Archer Milton Huntington (1870–1955). Erected on what was once land farmed by the ornithologist-artist John James Audubon, its tenants over the years have included the American Academy of Arts and Letters, American Geographical Society, American Numismatic Society, George Gustave Heye Museum of the American Indian, and Spanish Church of Our Lady of Hope. At the very center of the quadrangle is the institution that was always closest to Huntington’s heart. In 1904 he founded what is now the Hispanic Society Museum & Library (HSM&L)…