Docent Symposium - Washington, DC - Part 2

After a quick meeting, I raced over to The Phillips Collection because a) they have an outstanding collection and b) a new exhibition debuted about The Nabis. As I entered the main floor I found myself face to face with this massive Diebenkorn painting, "Girl With Plant." I took 8 zillion close up photos of brushstrokes because I was so in awe. I promised the security guard that I wasn't crazy, but that did not dissuade him from eagle eyeing me the entire time.

The painting is massive, 80 inches by 69.5" ... Diebenkorn is a beast, a true beast. Look at how many colors and shades of yellow are in the yellow areas.

Of course there was a crowd around Renoir's Boating Party, but honestly, I have zero interest. That's nothing but cotton candy and marshmellow cream. Give me grittiness, rawness, imperfection. I flew right past, turned the corner and entered a new room where I found all the grit I could handle in Jacob Kainen. I fell in love when I saw his painting, but who is Jacob Kainen??? I'd never heard of him! I found several of his paintings during this trip, and he's now at the top of my art crush list. I want to paint like this. By the way, I love the location of his signature.

There's definitely something Diebenkorn-ish about this, only less messy. And I see some of the blockiness of Hans Hoffman. If that chair was orange instead of red, you'd basically have Hans'  color palette.

I like the dark outline of the figure. I like the unnatural hue of her skin. I love the underpainting and mixture of reds and greens. It's just magical. I may have to copy this painting.

Speaking of gritty and messy ...

Philip Guston is the man for that. Look at that pukey stinky blob of yellow ochre right there. (above the word blob) What's better than that?

Joan Mitchell always works. Just look at Joan. Is she fierce or what?

And to my surprise, I found a Cezanne that truly knocked my socks off. Don't get me wrong, I respect and love his still lifes, but this is definitely more my speed. Phenomenal.

The Nabi exhibition was fantastic. The lighting was so dark that my pics are horrible, but if you're curious, head over to the Phillips website and have a look online. Bonnard is probably my favorite of the Nabis.

With a late afternoon meeting approaching, I knew I had to haul it over to the Portrait Gallery to say hello to some old favorites and see some bucket list pieces.

As a girl born and raised in South Carolina, currently living in Atlanta, I know I'm supposed to hate this guy for scorching our earth, but let's be honest, he was fighting for the right reasons. And this portrait is absolutely spectacular. The red wall is genius. I've read a lot about Sherman, and I can't help but think that this was probably the neatest and tidiest his hair ever looked. He's almost handsome.

This is a portrait of Marian Anderson by Beauford Delaney. If you know Delaney, he loves the color yellow and uses it in a lot of his portraits. (There's one in the permanent collection of the High Museum.) But here's something kind of interesting ... the other night we were watching Jeopardy and the answer to Final Jeopardy was "Who is Marian Anderson?" and Scott and I both got it wrong. So now I know who Marian Anderson is.

Of course, I had to say hello to Elaine de Kooning's painting of JFK. Larger than life, literally and figuratively.

I love Elaine's slashy, colorful, bold energy. Another force of nature. Smoke 'em if you got 'em, sister.

Elaine de Kooning

And last but not least, I had not seen the Obama portraits before, so I had to see those.

Amy Sherald is the artist for the First Lady's portrait.

Kehinde Wiley is the artist for #44. If you live in or visit Atlanta you can see a Kehinde Wiley painting at the High Museum of Art. Look at the green reflections from the plants on Barack's suit. Oooohee, that's good stuff.

And lastly, I breezed through the Outsider/Self Taught/ Folk art section in the American Art Museum next door.

And this is where I discovered the work of James Hampton from Elloree, South Carolina. Elloree is near Orangeburg, South Carolina, which probably doesn't mean much to you, but it is where my mother and her side of the family grew up. There ain't much happening in Elloree, and I'd bet you $100 that people who live in Elloree have NO IDEA who this artist is.

But that doesn't matter because "St. James" is in the damn Smithsonian. You see James Hampton was a janitor living in DC and he built this insane religious altarpiece called, "The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations' Millennium General Assembly" out of tin foil, light bulbs, jelly jars and other scavenged parts and pieces. But let me repeat ... TIN FOIL. A boatload of tin foil.

When he wasn't working as a janitor, he spent his extra time working on these amazing pieces in a rented garage. And no one had a clue what was going on until after Hampton died, the man he was renting from went to collect the rent. He was stunned to open the garage and discover this ... isn't that a phenomenal story? Outsider / folk art never ceases to excite me. I love stories like this.

There's also the story of Dan Miller. Dan is one of the artists affiliated with Creative Growth, a studio art program for people with developmental challenges. There are a lot of very talented artists that have done amazing work through Creative Growth, and Dan is certainly a star. I love his abstracts.

My last adventure was a very fast stroll through the Luce Foundation Center, a gorgeous space filled with art that that galleries do not have space for, but yet you can weave in and out of the stacks and still enjoy nice, close up views of exciting works of art.

And then it was time to officially kick off the symposium!

We have a great team!

 At the legendary Mayflower Hotel

Our speaker was Gus Casely Hayford, the director of the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art. Gus talked about the Lost Kingdoms of Africa, looted treasures and how art and artifacts can hold a society together. He's an excellent speaker.

Then we settled in for two days of break out sessions on how to engage museum visitors. I learned so much and met so many nice people. What an amazing experience. Here are a few more pics from the symposium.

I snuck out on Friday night to have dinner with my cousin and his wife. So fun. 

Representing the High Museum 

 Touring the National Gallery with my friend Bryan

Peacock Room at the Freer Sackler Museum

I've already incorporated many of the ideas from this symposium into my tours at the High Museum, and it's made such a big difference. As a new docent I'm hungry for tips on how to better engage my groups, and now I have a whole new toolkit of ideas!

The next symposium will be in 2021 in Kansas City. We'll go as a group to Kansas City in preparation for our turn to host in 2023 in Atlanta.