This exhibition will debate beauty's relevance and value, presenting a range of works whose incontrovertible elegance, beauty and opulence belie a more serious social, cultural or political agenda. Perceived as a kind of modernist dividing line in the
Duchamp/Matisse standoff, the debate over beauty's relevance and value remains pressing in today's discourse on contemporary art.
Curatorial Statement
We often hear that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but the fact is, it's more complicated than that. Umberto Eco's new book, A History of Beauty, which was the inspiration for the current exhibition, discusses how our perceptions and conceptions of art and beauty are really a dynamic between object and cultural context well before the beholder weights in. Like Eco's book, Time's Arrow hops and skips through current art historical practices with abandon, presenting a range of work whose incontrovertible ornamentation, beauty and opulence belie a more serious social, cultural or political agenda.
Andre Breton declares "Beauty will be CONVULSIVE or will not be at all." Virginia Woolf decries "The beauty of the world… has two edges, one of laughter, one of anguish, cutting the heart asunder." In other words, beauty, without the depth wrought by heartbreak, wisdom and human experience, is merely eye candy.
— Janine Cirincione
Acknowledgements
The Rotunda Gallery is grateful for the generous support of our exhibition and education programs from Astoria Federal, the Lily Auchincloss Foundation, the Sally and Milton Avery Foundation, Bloomberg L.P., Citigroup Foundation, Commerce Bank, Con Edison, Forest City Ratner Companies, the William Randolph Hearst Foundation, the Independence Community Foundation, the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, the New York Times Company Foundation, the Pepsi Cola/Hip-Hop Summit Partnership, Target, Washington Mutual Bank, as well as numerous individuals.
Programs are made possible in part by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts; the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs; the New York City Department of Youth and Community Development; Borough President Marty Markowitz; New York City Council members Erik Martin Dilan, Lewis Fidler, Vincent Gentile, and Al Vann; and the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
The Rotunda Gallery is a program of BRIC/Brooklyn Information & Culture.
Janine Cirincione, curator
Admission is FREE
OPENING NIGHT RECEPTION: Thursday, November 17 - 6pm-8pm