Visual Arts

The Washington University School of Art is the oldest university-affiliated art school in the nation. The Washington University Gallery of Art was the first art museum west of the Mississippi. (Both date back to 1879 as part of the St. Louis School and Museum of Fine Arts, which also gave rise to the Saint Louis Art Museum.)

Over the years, the School of Art has been home to faculty such as Max Beckmann and Philip Guston, and in 2003 placed 21st in the U.S. News & World Report rankings of graduate and professional schools. Meanwhile, the Gallery of boasts one of the finest university collections in the United States, with an exceptionally strong modern collection pioneered by former curator H.W. Janson (1913-1982), author of the influential textbook History of Art.

In recent years, the School of Art and the Gallery of Art have joined with the School of Architecture, the Department of Art History & Archaeology in Arts & Sciences and the Art & Architecture Library as part of the new Sam Fox Arts Center, a campus-wide umbrella organization for the study and promotion of visual culture. Plans call for the development of collaborative, interdisciplinary curricula and programs as well as the creation of new facilities designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Fumihiko Maki.

Faculty Experts:

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Elizabeth Childs Associate professor of art history Childs' major interests are French 19th-Century visual culture, art, and politics, exoticism (particularly the work of Paul Gauguin), history of photography, and caricature. Direct contact: (314) 935-5287 / ecchilds@wustl.edu

Stanley Strembicki Strembicki is a nationally and internationally exhibited photographer. Major portfolios range from 12 years of photographing Mardi Gras in New Orleans and Carnival in Italy to figure studies, digital works, photographs in and around Memphis and Graceland, urban landscapes of Italy and Western Europe, ... Expertise: Mardi Gras, New Orleans, Carnival in Italy, figure studies, digital works, Memphis, Graceland, … Direct contact: (314) 935-8406 / strembicki@wustl.edu

Mark Rollins Chair of Philosophy in Arts & Sciences Rollins academic interests include topics at the intersection of aesthetics and cognitive science. Those include theories of picture perception, the role of attention in aesthetic experience and a cognitive psychology of artistic style. Expertise: aesthetics, cognitive science Direct contact: (314) 935-6873 / mark@wustl.edu

William E. Wallace Barbara Murphy Bryant Distinguished Professor of Art History William Wallace Download Wallace is an internationally recognized authority on Michelangelo and his contemporaries. In addition to more than forty articles (as well as two works of fiction), he is the author and editor of four books on Michelangelo: Michelangelo at San Lorenzo: The Genius as Entrepreneur (Cambridge 1994); ... Expertise: Early and High Renaissance Art, Italian Renaissance Architecture, Leonardo, Mannerism, Michelangelo, Old Master drawings, Raphael, … Media assistance: (314) 935-8494 / liam_otten@wustl.edu

Patrick Schuchard E. Desmond Lee Professor for Community Collaboration Patrick Schuchard Download Schuchard is a widely exhibited aritst whose current practice weaves elements of painting, sculpture, architecture, public policy and even city planning into remarkably whole cloth. Recent projects range from studio portraiture, book illustrations and public murals to University Lofts, a $5.6 million ... Expertise: community development, entrepreneurship, murals, painting, portraiture, public art, sculpture Direct contact: (314) 935-8664 / wpschuch@art.wustl.edu

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News Stories & Tip Sheets:

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Harriet Hosmer Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum to showcase pioneering sculptor May 2 to July 21 April 23, 2008 -- Harriet Hosmer, Oenone (1854-55) Download Neoclassical sculptor Harriet Goodhue Hosmer (1830-1908) was one of the most successful women artists of her day, described by the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning as "a perfectly emancipated female." She was also the first woman to study anatomy at what would become the Washington University School of Medicine and produced many of her most significant works — such as the bronze statue of Missouri senator Thomas Hart Benton in Lafayette Park — for St. Louis patrons. This summer the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum will join other local institutions in celebrating Hosmer's life and work with a special Teaching Gallery exhibition, on view May 2 to July 21.

The Barbizon School Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum to explore 19th-century landscape painting May 2 to July 21 April 2, 2008 -- Jules Dupré, The River (c.1850) Download Between 1830 and 1880 a loosely associated group of landscape painters lived and worked in the small farming village of Barbizon, France. Rejecting the traditional artistic conventions of academic landscape painting, such as the Ideal, the Pastoral, and the Heroic, they strived instead to depict an unmediated version of nature — an approach that would prove central to later avant-garde movements such as Impressionism. In May the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum will present *The Barbizon School and the Nature of Landscape,* an exhibition of close to 40 works by leading Barbizon figures and by later French and American artists who were influenced by the school.

Wee reads Miniature book exhibition opens at WUSTL March 27, 2008 -- Photo by David Kilper Miniature books have served many purposes, from political propaganda to curiosities. Throughout history, people have been fascinated by extremes, whether it's the tallest mountain, the longest river or the deepest sea. Julian Edison is no exception — only instead of things large, it's small books that fascinate him. Edison, a noted miniature book collector, is displaying approximately 200 of his volumes in the exhibition "Miniature Books: 4,000 Years of Tiny Treasures," which recently opened at Washington University in St. Louis' Olin Library.

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Related News Clips:

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Show More Visual Arts Clips

Getty Museum Buys a Seldom-Exhibited Gauguin The New York Times March 12, 2008 -- The J. Paul Getty Museum announced Tuesday that it had acquired "Arii Matamoe," an 1892 painting by Paul Gauguin that has been in a private collection in Switzerland for decades and has been exhibited publicly only once since 1946. Elizabeth Childs, a Gauguin scholar who is chairwoman of WUSTL's art history and archaeology department, comments.

Blonde Ambition: Iconic Blondes Shape History ABC News -- Good Morning America Jan. 22, 2008 -- The art exhibit "Beauty and the Blonde: An Exploration of American Art and Popular Culture," is being presented by WUSTL's Kemper Art Museum. It is curated by Catharina Manchanda, and it includes the famous silkscreens of Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe and Roy Lichtenstein's pop art images of blondes in comics.

Winners of the 2008 Awards for Distinction Announced ArtDaily.org Jan. 7, 2008 -- Ronald Leax, WUSTL professor of art, received a CAA award as part of their eleven Awards for Distinction for 2008. These annual awards honor outstanding member achievements and reaffirm CAA's mission to encourage the highest standards of scholarship, practice, and teaching in the arts.

A most unlikely father and son CBS Evening News / Assignment America and 6 others Aug. 13, 2007 -- This past Friday, on the CBS Evening News, Steve Hartman's "Assignment America" segment featured the special relationship between WUSTL architecture professor Bob Hansman and his adopted son Jovan.

Korean Comics: A Society through Small Frames at Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum ArtDaily.org Aug. 10, 2007 -- Recent years have seen an explosion of interest in Japanese manga, or comic books, in the United States, yet Korean comics remain relatively unknown. This fall, the WUSTL's Kemper Art Museum will present Korean Comics: A Society through Small Frames, a rare U.S. exhibition of work from both North and South Korea. The exhibition provides a decade-by-decade glimpse of the evolving social realities in contemporary Korea, as depicted in comics ranging from popular children's entertainment to aggressive forms of political commentary.

Maki Designs Art Complex in St. Louis Art in America, Dexigner.com and 2 others Jan. 16, 2007 -- The January issue of Art in America includes a story on architect Fumihiko Maki, who was commissioned by WUSTL in 1960 to design Steinberg Hall as a home for the university's highly regarded art collection. Nine years ago he was selected again to design an entire arts campus, to be called the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts. It opened in October. The article mentions current exhibits organized by museum director Sabine Eckmann, chief curator Lutz Koepnick, and others.

An ancient masterpiece or a master's forgery? The New York Times and 1 others April 19, 2005 -- A scholar has suggested that ''Laocoon,'' a fabled sculpture whose unearthing in 1506 has deeply influenced thinking about the ancient Greeks and the nature of the visual arts, may well be a Renaissance forgery -- possibly by Michelangelo himself. WUSTL art history professor William Wallace comments.

Clark B. Fitz-Gerald, 87, Sculptor New York Times Nov. 1, 2004 -- Obituary for Clark Battle Fitz-Gerald, a sculptor who produced public commissions for several American cities, churches and universities. He taught at several schools, including WUSTL. In 1956, he gave up teaching and moved to Castine to be a sculptor.

Healing the scars of violence with art National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" and 42 others April 16, 2004 -- Artist's rendering of Krysztof Wodiczko's The St. Louis Projection. Download Krzysztof Wodiczko made his reputation 20 years ago taking on big political issues. At the height of the apartheid era, he projected a swastika onto South Africa's embassy in London. In recent years, he's added audio to his multimedia projects and turned from the political to the personal. In 1998, he used audio and video projected onto the Bunker Hill Monument to tell the stories of mothers from Charlestown who'd lost children to murder. When he was invited to mount one of his projections in St. Louis by Washington University, he says he once again wanted to give voice to people who had lost loved ones to violence.

More News:

Designs unveiled
$56.8 million center for the visual arts and design to be named in honor of St. Louis civic and philanthropic leader Sam Fox
Dec. 17, 2002 - Washington University in St. Louis will name a new $56.8 million campus center for the visual arts and design in honor of Sam Fox, one of St. Louis' most prominent civic and philanthropic leaders and one of the University's staunchest supporters, Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton has announced. The Sam Fox Arts Center links three academic units -- the School of Architecture, the School of Art and the Department of Art History and Archaeology in Arts & Sciences -- with the University's nationally recognized Gallery of Art and Art & Architecture Library. It's facilities will include two new buildings designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Fumihiko Maki -- an art museum and a second building for the School of Art -- that will be integrated, also according to Maki's design, with three renovated structures. This integration will produce new opportunities for research, interdisciplinary study and teaching in visual arts and design.