Pierre-Auguste Renoir, A Box at the Theater (At the Concert), 1880
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts.
Image © Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute
Claude Monet, The Cliffs at Étretat, 1885
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts.
Image © Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute
Impressionism from the Clark at MFA Houston International tour of ‘The Age of Impressionism: Great French Paintings from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute’ is on view at Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, from December 22, 2013 to March 23, 2014.]]>
Source: Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
The exhibition features 73 paintings by artists such as Édouard Manet, Edgar Degas, Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Berthe Morisot, Camille Pissarro and Alfred Sisley, as well as Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Jean-François Millet, Jean-Léon Gérôme, William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Pierre Bonnard, among others.
Most of the works in the collection were acquired by Sterling and Francine Clark between 1910 and 1950. Sterling Clark, an heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune, began collecting art in Paris after a distinguished career in the United States Army. The couple assembled their collection based on their personal tastes, amassing paintings, silver, sculpture, porcelain, drawings and prints for their homes in Paris and New York. In 1950, the Clarks decided to create a permanent, public home for their collection. Drawn by the setting of the surrounding Berkshires and the appeal of its proximity to the academic community of Williams College, they settled on a 140-acre site in Williamstown, Massachusetts. The Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute opened in 1955. Since its inception, the Institute has pursued a dual mission as both a museum and a center for research and higher education in the visual arts.
The 73 paintings by 25 artists in the exhibition span 70 years and not only tell the story of the Clarks’ devotion and passion for collecting but of painting in nineteenth-century France, from the Orientalist works of Gérôme to the Barbizon paintings of Corot and Rousseau to the Impressionist masterpieces of Manet, Degas, Monet, Renoir, Sisley and Pissarro, and concludes with the early modern output of Toulouse-Lautrec and Bonnard. Portraits, landscapes, marines, still lifes and scenes of everyday life are all represented.
“The Clark is delighted to have this opportunity to bring the exhibition back to the United States to complete the world tour“, said Clark director Michael Conforti. Gary Tinterow, Director of the MFAH, declared that “It’s a spectacular exhibition and we are thrilled to have the chance to present the show in Houston“.
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