Old master drawings kept in storage, their access limited to a few, will now be made widely accessible in this new series which will eventually include all drawings in some 70 midwestern collections. The first volume introduces a corpus of the rarest of European drawings through the year 1500, a time when artists had just begun to value drawings as works of art. It presents 30 entries written by 12 scholars, each a specialist in the art of the period, and each with immediate access to the artwork itself. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
"Unique and fragile objects, old master drawings are kept in storage, their access limited to knowing scholars, other artists, and dedicated collectors. Now, through the sponsorship of the Midwest Art History Society and the commendable efforts of Burton Dunbar and Edward Olszewski, the drawings will be readily accessible to everyone. This first volume of Drawings in Midwestern Collections offers a full listing of old master drawings from collections throughout the Midwest. Thoroughly researched, this important reference book introduces a corpus of the rarest of European drawings through the year 1500, a time when artists had just begun to value drawings as works of art, and from which only a limited number of drawings have survived. Each of the thirty entries in this volume is written by a scholar who has immediate access to the artwork itself and who is a specialist in the art of that period. In addition to basic information about the work, the authors have commented on each drawing's artistic significance and on problems surrounding it. Included also are reproductions of the drawings as well as numerous illustrations of comparable works from other American and European collections. Drawings in Midwestern Collections presents previously unpublished technical information on many of the drawings, argues for the new attribution of several of them, provides an up-to- date summary of scholarship on each work, and, taken as a whole, provides insight into the diversity of the holdings of midwestern museums. The first in a series of books that will include all drawings in more than seventy midwestern collections, Drawings in Midwestern Collections: Volume I, Early Works is certain to enrich the lives of students, scholars, museum personnel, and the general public."--Publishers website.
This collection of essays, which derive from a symposium held at the Art Institute of Chicago in 2005, tells the story of how medieval art was collected by both individuals and institutions in the American Midwest. This book will appeal to both medievalists and scholars of nineteenth- and twentieth century American history. In addition, it will also appeal to scholars who are interested in museum studies and the history of collecting. The essays in the first section, “Collecting and Displaying Medieval Art,” consider the formation of medieval art collections at influential cultural institutions in three of the most important centers of industry and culture in the Midwest: Chicago, Detroit and Cleveland. The second section, “Medieval Art as Inspiration and Education,” examines the motives of both private donors and museum professionals in forming collections and establishing period rooms and cloistered spaces at museums in Toledo, Kansas City, and St. Louis, among others. At the opposite end of the spectrum was a new trend in curatorial practice, beginning in the 1930s, that favored the dismantling of period rooms and espoused displaying historical works of art in more distinctly modern settings, a theme that pervades section three, “Medieval Art and Modernism.” An essay on medieval art in Midwestern university art museums and another one that considers the impact of works from medieval collections in special exhibitions serve as a remarkable coda to the rest of the volume. Two appendices follow this, one that provides an overview of medieval art collections in Midwestern university museums and another which provides a biographical sketch of prominent dealers of medieval art from 1900-1950.
