Published: June 26, 2008 09:59 am            

ART: Castellani shows off "Currents"

Every art gallery should have an opportunity to present its work the way the Castellani Art Museum is about to present some of its own.

For the project “Currents: Movements in Western Art Since 1830,” opening this weekend, the biggest room in the building will have its walls covered salon-style (meaning paintings clustered together for easy comparison) with work from its permanent collection, and organized so that modern art’s major movements can be identified and compared.

More than 160 works will be on display in the museum’s central gallery, including kinetic sculptures and three-dimensional works, in this ambitious undertaking. It is the first time the Castellani has offered anything this inclusive, or this big.

“All of it is from our permanent collection,” director Kate Koperski said. “Many of these works have never been displayed. We’re presenting a timeline, from 1830 to the present, of 22 major movements and trends in the evolution of art.”

Consequently, it is a learning experience in addition to a blizzard of representative examples of modern and contemporary art. The luminaries — Picasso, Cassatt, Renoir, Nevelson, Dufy, Kandinsky, Rauschenberg, Warhol and others — are all there, closely packed to one another on the walls. Sculptures by Alexander Calder and Harry Bertoia are on the floor.

Beginning with the Hudson River School and progressing through Impressionism, Expressionism, the Ashcan School and Surrealism and Op Art and the rest, the exhibition is meant to offer some understanding of the development of different forms of art and their influence on one another.

“Mr. Castellani wanted this place to be known as an education museum,” Koperski said of the building on the Niagara University campus. “This is intended as an educational experience and an astonishing visual collection.”

Astonishing is right. Few gallery-goers have ever been presented with a display such as this, masterpieces tightly arranged on a wall so that some semblance of history, comparison and relative influence can be discerned.

“It’s a tool to help the individual who feels that art museums aren’t all that accessible,” education coordinator Marian Grunfeld said. “People can see how each artists approaches the subject matter.”

Added marketing director Susan Clements, “What’s great about this is that people will be able to walk around the room and get a sense of how art evolves, from 1830 to the present.”

The Castellani staff is clearly energized by this complex presentation.

“This is exciting,” curator Michael Beam said. “We’ve never seen a museum in this region do this before. We’re featuring a substantial part of our collection, and it even shows a history of different frame styles. You’ll see carved frames, to wooden, to plastic.”

The exhibition is also an opportunity for the museum to reinforce its mission, and its position in the art world.

“There is a gap in the regional scene, and we fill it very nicely,” Koperski said. “We’re going back to artists, and movements, that we can treat in much better depth. Armand Castellani was conscious that this is a university museum, surrounded by students. This installation is an art piece in itself.”



—Ed Adamczyk is a freelance writer from Kenmore.



IF YOU GO

* WHAT: “Currents: Movements in Western Art Since 1830”

* WHERE: Castellani Art Museum, on the campus of Niagara University, Lewiston

* WHEN: Sunday-Sept. 21; the museum is open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday and 1-5 p.m. Sunday

* MORE INFORMATION: Call 286-8200

        

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