Walter Randel Gallery is pleased to announce the rotating winter exhibition Kunstkammer I & II. The critic Edward Lucie-Smith has described the Kunstkammer as an assemblage of various art objects in a single room; despite their miscellaneous character, these works of art, found in the studios of artists, studies of scholars and homes of collectors of discernment from the past, may be said to precede the practice of shows in formal galleries and museums of today.

This exhibition includes important works from all over the world – Europe, Asia, Africa, Oceania, and New World cultures are represented, spanning two millennia. Visitors will have the opportunity to see and acquire paintings, sculptures, ceramics, and photography, made by both historical figures and living artists; in the proximity of their installation, care has been taken to develop interactive relations between the objects, regardless of their date or culture.

Informed appreciation for art is based upon an individual’s quest for quality and knowledge. In short, it is a matter of connoisseurship, a skill that can be trained by experience over time. Our sensibility must be fueled by curiosity; looking at art from differing cultures is actually not so daunting as the task might seem.

For today's collector, with so much art available to the public, finding out what to collect is not the major issue; rather, one can seek and enjoy the formal success of almost any work of art, that is, how the way its appearance in relation to its intent, affects the viewer. Understanding works from earlier periods does not have to depend upon obscure historical scholarship; rather, appreciation can be developed by recognition of an artwork’s innate characteristics – something the painter Willem de Kooning recognized when he wrote in a sketchbook that “There’s no way of looking at a work of art by itself it’s not self-evident. It needs a history; it needs a lot of talking about. It’s part of a whole man’s life.”

If we listen to de Kooning, collecting can be understood as a wonderful, exciting process whereby the object’s distance – the result of institutional possession – is denied. Collecting is in fact the expression of sensibility. As a result, the immediacy of proximity and ownership is a life-enhancing and, sometimes, a life-changing experience. The variety of fine and decorative arts available in this two-part show (“Kunstkammer I and II”) argues against the pernicious myth that art is a luxury; indeed, it is more of a requirement, in which contact with creativity is truly a matter of absolute necessity.

Part II of this exhibition will be rotated January 28 and will run through March 6, 2010 and will include paintings by Arlan Huang and photographs by Bruna Stude.

Pictured:

Top Left: Africa, Bamana Peoples, Kore Society Mask,
19th Century, Height: 17”

Middle Left: Ted Kurahara, Alizarin Crimson over Black,
Acrylic on Canvas, 2008, 24” x 24”

Bottom Left: Charles Birnbaum, Foucanlong,
2007, Porcelain, Height: 12”