Cleveland Museum of Art presents all the news that’s fit to paint
We live in a world of unparalleled communication miracles. Right now, virtually anywhere in a world a person can attend an event and with the pressing of their finger on a screen take an image and share it around the planet in a matter of seconds. This was not always the case.
In the 1700s famous painters such as Michele Marieschi, Giovanni Paolo Panini, Antonio JoliCanaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal), Luca Carlevaris and Pierre-Jacques Volaire to name a few were commissioned by the very wealthy and well connected to paint expansive canvases of important events of note.
Even though the Gutenberg printing press had been churning out millions of books for the masses since 1439 these “Eyewitness Views” of pompous and glorious events ended up in the exclusive collections of the very well to do and where viewed by only a fortunate few.
Through May 20, 2018 the Cleveland Museum of Art will be sharing their newest exhibit with the world. Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe showcases outstanding masterworks by revered artists who were in some cases on hand to record some of the most noteworthy events and spectacles of the eighteenth century. The exhibit features nearly 40 finely detailed works that literally take you back in time to the ornate piazzas, monuments, canals, ports, palaces and churches of Venice, Rome, Paris, Warsaw and other major cities of Europe.
While clothing has certainly changed over the centuries one can still sense the excitement as the crowd awaits the procession of a pope or king who in some cases threw coins into the crowd as they passed by.
Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe is co-organized by the Cleveland Museum of Art, the J. Paul Getty Museum and the Minneapolis Institute of Art and will be housed in the Kelvin and Eleanor Smith Foundation Exhibition Hall through May 20, 2018.
The recorded events range from the spectacular pageantry of a Venetian regatta, the solemn ritual of religious processions to horrific natural and man-made disasters such as fires and volcanic eruptions. The secret to the paintings popularity even to this day is the amount of careful detail that went into each work. Not only are the buildings captured in stunning detail but such things as costume, décor and personality of the participants themselves are vividly portrayed.
While some of the paintings are eyewitness accounts of the artists some are not. On occasion artists were confronted with the challenge of painting an event that they had not personally attended. Not only that, but in some cases the artist took full creative license by depicting an event with impossible settings such as a panoramic interior view of a church without the columns blocking the view or a canal in Venice that is narrowed in the painting so as to give more drama to the richly decorated flotilla of boats.
The exhibit is divided into four thematic sections that celebrate the different aspects of this particular genre of painting. You will walk through, Memory and Manipulation, Civic and Religious Ritual, Festival and Spectacle, Disaster and Destruction. Be sure to make a stop at the gift shop located at the end of the exhibit to browse the collection of related books and history related items that are for sale.
Along with the exhibit, tours will be held on Tuesday and Thursdays at 11 a.m. and Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m. through May 6, 2018. An exhibition ticket is required and tours depart from the information desk.
Curator Talks with Betsy Wieseman will be held at noon on Tuesdays: March 27, April 10 and May 15. The talks are titled “Fact or Fiction” as Curator Betsy Wieseman points out how the various artists would manipulate their works to “improve” on reality in order to meet the expectation of their status conscious clientele.
Tuesdays in March from 1 to 2 p.m. will also feature the Classical Café Series in the atrium for a series of live performances of 18th-century classical music.
Other notable events at the museum in connection with the exhibit include:
Landscape Painting Workshops Sunday, April 22, 1:00–3:30 p.m. Sunday, May 20, 1:00–3:30 p.m.
Let the paintings in Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe inspire your own landscape painting. After a visit to the exhibition, learn about basic color mixing, composition, and acrylic painting techniques. Feel free to bring a photo of a favorite landscape or work from the exhibition, or your imagination! Beginners are welcome. Cost is $20 or for CMA members $18. (Each person will make an acrylic painting on an 11-x-14-inch canvas.)
MIX: Spectacle
Friday, May 4, 6:00–10:00 p.m.
In the 1700s, Venice was renowned for staging the most lavish and extravagant celebrations in all of Europe. There were no cameras, so rulers and aristocrats commissioned magnificent paintings as a way of proclaiming their status and documenting significant milestones in their life. Some of these paintings are displayed in Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe. We’ll party like it’s 1799 with live music from Cleveland’s own Mourning a Blkstar (in collaboration with choreographer Amy Notley and wearable art by Ron Shelton), creating our own spectacle.
Play Day at CMA: Eyewitness Views
Sunday, May 6, 11:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Celebrate the special exhibition Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe through play, art making, stories, music, and movement, plus free tickets to the exhibition! Bring your family, friends, or come on your own; expect activities for all ages! Visit ClevelandArt.org for details.
Performance
Chamber Music in the Galleries
Wednesday, March 7, 6:00 p.m.
Wednesday, May 2, 6:00 p.m.
Free; no tickets required
Baroque chamber ensembles from Case Western Reserve University under the direction of Julie Andrijeski perform two programs in conjunction with the exhibition Eyewitness Views: Making History in Eighteenth-Century Europe as part of the museum’s ongoingChamber Music in the Galleries series. The March 7 concert will also feature special guest Maria Cleary, a period harp specialist.
Tickets for the exhibit may be purchased online at www.clevelandart.org for half hour start times during regular museum hours. The exhibit is free to museum members, $6 for museum member’s guests, $12 for adults, $6 for children 6-17, $10 for Senior Citizens and Students. The museum is closed on Mondays but is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays as well as 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Wednesdays and Fridays.
