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American beauty

Andrew Lambirth

Wednesday, 30th April 2008

The American Scene
The British Museum

Coming of Age: American Art, 1850s to 1950s
Dulwich Picture Gallery

In comparison, Dulwich’s show starts well, but then fades away. It isn’t helped by its title, which leads the visitor to expect greater things than are delivered. All the exhibits come from the Addison Gallery of American Art in Massachusetts, which has quite clearly pursued a policy of buying names rather than paintings. In other words, minor works by major artists tell a different story, in footnotes rather than headlines. That’s not to say that there are no enjoyable pictures here.

In the first room, a small Frederic Church offers a vast panorama, and ‘The Coming Storm’ by Albert Bierstadt is a lovely piece of evocative landscape painting, intense and meticulous in its handling. Ralph Blakelock offers a combination of moody colour and crusty textures in ‘After Sundown’ (c.1892), which is very satisfying. In the second room, the John Twachtman is subdued but has a rather lovely shimmering surface. But there’s a garish Sargent, not a great Whistler and the large Hopper in the third room is not his most stimulating of subjects. Georgia O’Keefe as ever looks better in reproduction than in reality, as does the Man Ray, while the John Marin is frankly a mess. I love Milton Avery but can’t much admire the example here, while the Pollock has so little internal logic it looks as if it were cut out from a larger canvas. Baziotes and Albers acquit themselves better than most, but, as an account of the glory years of American art, this show is a failure.

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rosemary perkins

May 1st, 2008 5:34pm

Bear in mind that the Addison Gallery is part of a high school--Phillips Academy, Andover--where acquisitions are made for reasons and with budgets quite different from those that govern purchases and gifts in independent institutions. As a secondary school resource, the Addison Gallery collection is astonishing and probably unique.

Food for thought

Simon Hoggart

My favourite programme last week was France on a Plate (BBC4, Sunday) in which Dr Andrew Hussey investigated the link between gastronomy and la gloire; French glory and destiny.