The Kimbell Art Museum presents an innovative collaboration with filmmaker Philip Haas, an exhibition of five specially commissioned film installations. The installations both interpret works in the collection and stand as powerful works of art in themselves. They are shown for the first time as an exhibition this summer, after which the Museum will use them occasionally within collection displays in the galleries and in modified forms in various kinds of education and outreach. This free exhibition opens on Saturday, July 18, 2009.
Re-creation of the painting by Annibale Carracci, from the film installation The Butcher’s Shop
At the heart of Haas’s installations are short films that give form to ideas and feelings suggested by the chosen works from the collection. Though based on deep research into the original artists and cultures, they are poetic and sensuous in approach rather than factual like a documentary. On occasion actors, dancers, and settings form themselves into an ingenious, at times uncanny re-creation of the given work, as though it were a still that magically preceded the film to which it belongs. Allusions to other, related works of art further enrich the imagery.
Between 7 and 20 minutes in length and running continuously, the films are projected on screens of various unconventional formats and configurations. All five are accompanied by original music, and three appear in elaborate architectural and sculptural sets, further immersing the viewer in the experience.
Haas’s installations take us into the imaginative and creative world of the artist, open up new, freely imaginative ways of looking at art, and return us to familiar works with fresh eyes. They complement a full display of the Museum’s collection throughout the galleries, each installation occupying a space near the work that inspired it. The project is a new departure for the Kimbell and possibly the first such venture in any museum.
The Kimbell’s permanent collection is small in size, comprising fewer than 350 works of art, and distinguished by an extraordinary level of artistic quality and importance. Leaving to older and larger institutions the role of collecting broadly and in depth, the Kimbell has continued to pursue quality over quantity. Its holdings range from the third millennium B.C. to the mid-20th century, and include major works by Duccio, Fra Angelico, Caravaggio, Poussin, Velázquez, Bernini, Rembrandt, Goya, Monet, Cézanne, Picasso, Mondrian, and Matisse.
Kimbell Art Museum
3333 Camp Bowie Boulevard
Fort Worth, Texas 76107-2792
817-332-8451
www.kimbellart.org
