Nancy
Mowll Mathews is the Eugénie Prendergast
Senior Curator of 19th and 20th Century Art at the Williams College
Museum of Art. She directs the Prendergast Archive and Study Center
at WCMA, conducting ongoing research and organizing exhibitions and
publications on the Prendergasts and their era (1850-1950). She is
the co-author of two catalogues raisonnés: Mary Cassatt: The
Color Prints (1989) and Maurice Brazil Prendergast, Charles Prendergast:
A Catalogue Raisonné (1990) and is currently president of
the Catalogue Raisonné Scholars Association.
WCMA: How did you come up with the idea for this exhibition?
NM: I knew from our research on the Prendergast
catalogue raisonné that
Maurice Prendergast owned stock in a film company before 1912.
I thought this was a curious thing for him to do, so I started
searching for more information—what film company, what was
his connection to the movies, etc.? The more I looked into the
history of early cinema, the more parallels I found between his
work and the films made at the turn of the century. And furthermore,
there were parallels between these films and the work of other
artists of the Impressionist and Ash Can schools of painting in
America. Before long I was wishing I could see the paintings and
the films side-by-side, and voilà, an exhibition was born!
I never did find out what film company he had stock in . . .
WCMA: How long have you been researching the project ?
NM: I started this project about ten years ago. These kinds of
things take a long time.
WCMA: What makes this exhibition so special or
different from other exhibitions you’ve curated in the
past?
NM: The biggest difference from my past research and exhibitions
is working with film, which is an entirely new medium for me. I
had to learn not only a whole new history of visual culture at
the turn of the century but a new vocabulary and a new set of issues
in exhibiting this medium in a gallery.
WCMA: It’s atypical to show films in painting galleries,
isn’t it?
NM: This has become more common as contemporary artists explore
new ways of thinking about and displaying video art. I am borrowing
from contemporary art installations to show older art in a new
way. While film purists might object to seeing the films in any
other way than a theatrical projection (which we will also have
as part of the exhibition), I would like to point out that many
1890s devices, including the kinetoscope, were similar to the monitors
we will have in our galleries. So you see that our installation
has important historical precedents as well.
This exhibition is also different because of the iconic nature
of some of the works that we are borrowing. These are some of
the most famous works of American art, and we are putting them
into an entirely new artistic context—that of the moving
pictures of their era.
WCMA: What, for you, are some of the highlights of the exhibition?
NM: As you
walk through the exhibition, you will see paintings and films
hung side-by-side—that in itself will be a highlight.
Some of my favorite juxtapositions are: a film of the bodybuilder
Eugen Sandow with academic drawings (such as by John Singer Sargent)
of ideal male models, views of Venice by a Lumière filmmaker
alongside watercolors of the same subject by Maurice Prendergast,
a turn of the century bathing beach by John Sloan compared to an
Edison film, and the crowds of New York in paintings by George
Luks and George Bellows beside films of the same bustling streets.
WCMA: What do you hope people will take away after they see this
exhibition?
NM: My hope
is that in this exhibition people will suddenly begin to see
familiar
films and paintings in a new way. Impressionism
and Ash Can paintings are very well studied, and even the films
from this period are well known. But when they are joined together
they both take on new meanings. The lesson I learned is that the
art forms do not have firm boundaries but are constantly interacting
and inspiring mutual creativity—thus changing the way we
see and interpret the world.
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