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Eyes Wide Open:
A Collection in the Making |
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In his introduction to Guggenheim
Museum Bilbao Collection, the curator Francisco
Calvo Serrailler applauds how this institution has helped create the new
phenomenon of visual arts tourism. Explaining how the Guggenheim Bilbao has
become a template for what an art gallery can do for attracting visitors to a
post-industrial city, he draws attention 'to its most physically evident and
therefore most spectacular feature: the surprisingly original building
designed for it by the American architect Frank O. Gehry, which certainly
modified all the traditional rules for art museums'. However what I begin to absorb from this
book is not only about the considerable status of the collection in terms of
both quantity and quality as some kind of American-flavoured prestige brand.
There is a history of late twentieth century Spanish art sketched out in this
book that reveals so much about the dialogue between artists whose work is
part of an international scene. In an artistic climate that continues to be
choc-a-bloc with relativism, the prominence of work by Tapies, Saura,
Barcelo, Munoz and the Basque sculptors Chillida and Oteiza suggests an
inversion of the usual American over European hierarchy. One of the many
pleasures of this book is the way that several of the essays pay great
attention to the methods of European artists such as Klein, Clemente and Tapies
whose work has been in constant conversation with their American
contemporaries. Building on this question, Nicholas Cullinan's illuminating
essay on Cy Twombly provides a fittingly Euro-American back-story on how the Commodus series painted in Rome in 1963 met with such a muted response
when first shown at the Castelli Gallery in New York and yet nearly half a
century later (owned by Guggenheim Bilbao) is now seen as pivotal in
Twombly's artistic development. Obviously the purpose of the book is to
show that the reputation of Guggenheim Bilbao rests upon a stunning
collection that is housed in what is unmistakeably a Gehry building. Through
reproductions, the book offers an overview of all the 102 artworks contained
within its holding, while the series of essays reveals the connections
between their respective contexts, offering informed critical analysis of
each individual artist involved. I take away from this book the idea that the
secret of a successful art museum has to be about a steadfast confidence in
its own collection. Unfortunately
not all institutions are blessed with such a pedigree as the previous
Guggenheims or come affixed with the artworks that will generate the same
excitement. I could not help think of the challenge
facing two new regional museums in the north of England both of which are
contained in 'landmark' buildings by international architects in
post-industrial locations not unlike Bilbao: Mima which opened in
Middlesbrough in 2007, and the Hepworth, Wakefield in 2011. Having wallowed
in the joys and treats of Guggenheim Museum Bilbao Collection, my admiration goes out further to Mima in how their curators
have shown that a modern museum can create such a strong regional and
national identity within the community. As well as commissioning new work,
they have used their innovative exhibition programme to draw upon the
collection acquired by their forerunners Middlesbrough Art Gallery and
Cleveland Craft Centre, by constantly re-inventing and finding exciting ways
in which these works are shown. Similarly, Wakefield's municipal resource of
artworks will be the vital backbone to the development and survival of the
Hepworth. |