A TREASURE HOUSE OF "MODERN" ART: The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.

Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.

Among my favorite art museums in Washington, D.C. is the Phillips Collection, which I had the chance to visit last week. It had been five years since my previous visit, and I discovered that although many of the paintings on exhibit were familiar, there were new ones I hadn't seen before.

In 1921, Duncan Phillips, and his wife, Marjorie Acker Phillips, a painter, turned the family art collection into a public museum, the Phillips Memorial Gallery, in their home near Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C. The collection soon expanded and the family moved across the street, turning over the entire house to art.

From the beginning, the collection focused on “modern” art, acquiring paintings by French Impressionists such as Monet and Renoir, and Cubists such as Picasso and Braque. Giving equal focus to American and European artists, Phillips juxtaposed works by Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins, Maurice Prendergast, James Abbott McNeill Whistler and Albert Pinkham Ryder, with canvases by Pierre Bonnard, Édouard Vuillard, and Danish painter Peter Ilsted.

Luncheon of the Boating Party by Auguste Renoir.

The painting that makes the museum famous and draws the most visitors is Renoir’s Luncheon of the Boating Party. It still has pride of place, filling one wall in a room on the second floor of the museum.

The Rothko Room.

As the collection expanded over the years it became necessary to add a new wing to the museum. Every room is filled with remarkable art. One small room is devoted to four paintings by Mark Rothko, each intense canvas taking up most of each wall. Standing in the middle one feels bathed in color on every side.

Migration series by Jacob Lawrence. Top: "Families arrived at the station very early. They did not wish to miss their travel north." Bottom: "The migration spread."

Another room contains the paintings of the Jacob Lawrence Immigration Series, depicting the migration of African Americans from the rural South to the urban North.  As one circles the room, it is like reading a book. Jacob Lawrence wrote text to go with each painting, and in the gallery it is placed underneath the paintings. In the excellent gift shop on the first floor, you can buy a book in which all the paintings and text have been assembled as a story.

Detail, Three Lawyers by Honore Daumier.

In another room, one wall features a painting and drawings by the French artist Honore Daumier, a master at capturing facial expressions and body language, a skill he used to critique social norms of the 19th Century. Not much has changed in the 170 years since Daumier painted the Three Lawyers. The three men, aught in conversation, feel contemporary. 

The Road Menders by Vincent Van Gogh.

Detail of The Road Menders.

As I made my way through the museum, I became intrigued by the titles of paintings, finding that my first impression of what the painting was about wasn’t always reflected in the title. For instance, in Vincent Van Gogh’s painting Road Menders, I had to look hard to find the tiny figures in the center of the painting making repairs on the road.

The Blue Armchair by Guy Pene du Bois.

In another painting, The Blue Armchair by Guy Pene du Bois, the chair all but swallows the figure sitting in it, making the title fit perfectly.

Part of the Where We Meet exhibit. L-R: Black Girl by Elizabeth Catlett; Breeze Rustling Through Fall Flowers by Alma W. Thomas; Girl in a Turban by William H. Johnson.

On the second floor of the museum is a room devoted to an exhibit called Where We Meet, in which pieces from the Phillips Collection and the Howard University Museum of Art are shown together “in conversation”. This exhibit is new since my last visit. 

These are just a small sample of the art on display at the Phillips Collection. To see my posts about my visit in 2019, go to:

The Phillips Collection, Part 1: America's First Museum of Modern Art. 

and

The Phillips Collection, Part II: What Do You Hang Over the Fireplace?

And to learn about the Family Gallery at the museum, a guide to looking at art with children, go to my recent post at my Art and Books blog.

THE BROKEN PITCHER by William Adolphe Bouguereau, at the LEGION OF HONOR ART MUSEUM, San Francisco

The Broken Pitcher by William Adolphe Bouguereau, 1891

When I was growing up, the walls of our house were decorated with prints of paintings by famous artists--The Flower Seller by Diego Rivera, Bridge at Arles by Vincent Van Gogh, Snowy Egret by John James Audubon. My father loved art and after he retired from his career as a social worker, he became a docent at the Legion of Honor art museum in San Francisco. One day he brought home a poster of one of the paintings in the museum's permanent collection, The Broken Pitcher by William Adolphe Bouguereau. We had no more room in the house for art, so we hung the poster in the garage over the washing machine, where it stayed for many years. With every load of laundry, I gazed into the young girl's sad eyes, wondering what her life might have been. 

Paintings and silver tea set at Legion of Honor museum.

On a recent visit to the museum I had the chance to see the original painting, hung in a room with other 19th century paintings along with decorative arts of the time, and it brought back memories of my father's years as a docent. One of his roles was to lead tours, pointing out interesting facts about the artists and paintings. Here is what he had to say about The Broken Pitcher.

Gallery talk by Lester Scheaffer

If this gallery were a salon of the late 19^th century, you would see many more paintings like the one before us, “The Broken Pitcher,” than  the ones that hang in this gallery. There were two reasons—it conformed with the standards of The French Academy, and it was pleasing to a great many buyers of art.

This painting by Adolphe Bouguereau was done in 1891. While the hand of The Academy was not quite as firm in the 1890s as it was in the third quarter of the century, the basic criteria for acceptable painting was still present—restraint, simplicity, and balance. Experimental paintings were flatly rejected, the artist reviled. This is what happened to the Impressionists. Patrons from the middle class, the bourgeoisie, were attracted to paintings that were 1. ostentatious; 2. That told a story; 3. That did not violate their sense of morality; and 4. That these characteristics show on the surface—that is, nothing too subtle.

This painting is certainly balanced and it is centered. It ha a bit of the classical feeling, reminders of the old days, with the architectural design of the stone well, a suggestion of classical ruins in the background, and above all, the orderliness of the composition. The composition is truly linear, no problem whatever in following the lines of the drawing. The subject matter is sentimental and moralistic. The broken pitcher symbolizes this young girl’s loss of virginity, about which she is perplexed and anxious—“What do I do now?” 

Detail, The Broken Pitcher by Bouguereau.

Her big puppy dog eyes look out at us appealing for an answer. How could a viewer or a buyer not react favorably to a painting like this, at least the buyers of the 19^th century.

One person who reacted in the opposite way to Bouguereau, according to a story, was Auguste Renoir, the Impressionist. On being fitted for a new pair of glasses to correct his myopia, he threw them on the floor crying, “My God, I see like Bouguereau!”

If one had asked Bouguereau how he felt about Renoir and his friends, he probably would have said, “The feeling is mutual.”

Notes: Bouguereau  (1825-1905)–studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Prix de Rome 1850, great technical skill, slick painting but soft style, technically his paintings hold together, could paint any subject desired by the buying public, commercially successful in both Europe and the US.

 

At the Legion of Honor Art Museum, San Francisco, CA

  

THE PHILLIPS COLLECTION, Washington, D.C., Part 1: America’s First Museum of Modern Art

Detail from Auguste Renoir's Luncheon of the Boating Party at the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.

The Phillips Collection in Washington, DC. is not exactly off the beaten path, but many visitors to the capital do not realize the wealth of art that it contains. On our recent trip to Washington we discovered that the museum was just a few blocks from our hotel, so we went for a visit.

Music Room, Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. Note the ornate gold ceiling.

In 1921, Duncan Phillips, and his wife, Marjorie Acker Phillips, a painter, turned the family art collection into a public museum, the Phillips Memorial Gallery, in their home near Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C. The collection soon expanded and the family moved across the street, turning over the entire house to art.

Henri Matisse, "Interior with Egyptian Curtain." The curtain is based on a Middle Eastern textile owned by the artist.

From the beginning the collection focused on “modern” art, acquiring paintings by French Impressionists such as Monet and Renois and Cubists such as Picasso and Braque. Giving equal focus to American and European artists, Phillips juxtaposed works by Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins, Maurice Prendergast, James Abbott McNeill Whistler, and Albert Pinkham Ryder with canvases by Pierre Bonnard, Peter Ilsted and Édouard Vuillard.

Luncheon of the Boating Party by Auguste Renoir

But the painting that makes the museum famous and draws the most visitors is Renoir’s Luncheon of the Boating Party. On our recent visit to the Phillips Collection we happened upon a docent talk in which we learned the identities of all the people depicted in the painting and the history of its acquisition. (The man in the lower right corner is painter Gustave Caillobot, a friend and financial supporter of Renoir.) Phillips paid $125,000 for the painting–a sum far beyond anything that had ever been paid for a painting before. It turned out to be a good investment!

As the collection expanded over the years it became necessary to add a new wing to the museum. Every room is filled with remarkable art. One small room is devoted to four paintings by Mark Rothko, each intense canvas taking up most of each wall. Standing in the middle one feels bathed in color on every side. (It is the one room in the museum where photography is not allowed.)

Migration Series by Jacob Lawrence

Another room contains the 60 paintings of the Jacob Lawrence Immigration Series, depicting the migration of African Americans from the rural South to the urban North.. As one circles the room, it is like reading a book. In another room was a remarkable series of photographs, all taken at night and therefore very dark, but with small glimmers of light. The series traces stops on the Underground Railway as they look today.

The Phillips Collection continues to expand and in two years will be celebrating its 100th anniversary. Visiting the permanent collection is free. Special exhibits require paid tickets. We did not have time to see those.

The museum has a nice small café (where we had lunch) and a very nice gift shop. And when I went to the ground floor to the rest room, I passed an exhibit of children’s art created in a joint project of the museum and the Maryland Department of Education. Art education is so often neglected in today’s schools, so I was pleased to see the museum’s involvement in the local community.