Misplaced Pages

#837162

58-566: The American Visionary Art Museum ( AVAM ) is an art museum located in Baltimore, Maryland's Federal Hill neighborhood at 800 Key Highway . The museum specializes in the preservation and display of outsider art (also known as "intuitive art," "raw art," or "art brut"). The city agreed to give the museum a piece of land on the south shore of the Inner Harbor under the condition that its organizers would clean up residual pollution from

116-511: A 3rd floor banquet room that can accommodate up to 400 people for the museum's programs & engagements, as well as private rentals. In 2005, AVAM began its popular “Flicks from the Hill” series with generous support from the Hughes family. Each summer, the free, outdoor family film series features a selection of movies inspired by the museum's current thematic exhibition. The films are projected on

174-449: A collaboration of museums and galleries that are more interested with the categorization of art. They are interested in the potential use of folksonomy within museums and the requirements for post-processing of terms that have been gathered, both to test their utility and to deploy them in useful ways. The steve.museum is one example of a site that is experimenting with this collaborative philosophy. The participating institutions include

232-579: A copper paint factory and a whiskey warehouse that formerly occupied the site. It has been designated by Congress as America's national museum for visionary art . AVAM's 1.1 acre campus contains 67,000 square feet of exhibition space and a permanent collection of approximately 4,000 pieces. The permanent collection includes works by visionary artists like Ho Baron , Nek Chand , Howard Finster , Vanessa German , Mr. Imagination (aka Gregory Warmack), Leonard Knight , William Kurelek , Leo Sewell , Judith Scott , Ben Wilson , as well as over 40 pieces from

290-499: A large screen mounted below artist Adam Kurtzman's “Giant Golden Hand” in “The Hughes Family Outdoor Theater,” and the natural amphitheater of Federal Hill can seat more than 1000 visitors for this popular outdoor film series. The museum's many other programs include a summer arts camp and after-school program, established in 2009. AVAM is also a popular venue for weddings, hosting over 70 weddings annually. Rental/admission fees accounted for 72% of earned income in 2011, nearly three times

348-433: A major factor in social mobility (for example, getting a higher-paid, higher-status job). The argument states that certain art museums are aimed at perpetuating aristocratic and upper class ideals of taste and excludes segments of society without the social opportunities to develop such interest. The fine arts thus perpetuate social inequality by creating divisions between different social groups. This argument also ties in with

406-402: A number of online art catalogues and galleries that have been developed independently of the support of any individual museum. Many of these, like American Art Gallery, are attempts to develop galleries of artwork that are encyclopedic or historical in focus, while others are commercial efforts to sell the work of contemporary artists. A limited number of such sites have independent importance in

464-520: A section of the public. In classical times , religious institutions began to function as an early form of art gallery. Wealthy Roman collectors of engraved gems and other precious objects, such as Julius Caesar , often donated their collections to temples. It is unclear how easy it was in practice for the public to view these items. In Europe, from the Late Medieval period onwards, areas in royal palaces, castles , and large country houses of

522-612: A series of rooms dedicated to specific historic periods (e.g. Ancient Egypt ) or other significant themed groupings of works (e.g. the gypsotheque or collection of plaster casts as in the Ashmolean Museum ) within a museum with a more varied collection are referred to as specific galleries, e.g. Egyptian Gallery or Cast Gallery . Works on paper, such as drawings , pastels , watercolors , prints , and photographs are typically not permanently displayed for reasons of conservation . Instead, public access to these materials

580-405: A unanimous vote of the U.S. Congress—as America's "official national education center, repository and museum for self-taught, intuitive artistry," the museum has produced 18 thematic "mega-exhibitions" (as of 2012); added The Jim Rouse Visionary Center (in 2004) which more than doubled its exhibition space and provided an expansive, permanent home to its education department; and added new features to

638-418: A venue for other cultural exchanges and artistic activities, such as lectures, jewelry, performance arts , music concerts, or poetry readings. Art museums also frequently host themed temporary exhibitions, which often include items on loan from other collections. An institution dedicated to the display of art can be called an art museum or an art gallery, and the two terms may be used interchangeably. This

SECTION 10

#1732765407838

696-416: Is also sometimes used to describe businesses which display art for sale, but these are not art museums. Throughout history, large and expensive works of art have generally been commissioned by religious institutions or political leaders and been displayed in temples, churches, and palaces . Although these collections of art were not open to the general public, they were often made available for viewing for

754-618: Is an English organisation that mounts exhibitions around the world of contemporary automata by a collective of artists. Founded by Sue Jackson, the group played a central role in the revival of automata from the 1970s onwards, and Jackson championed the idea of automata as a form of contemporary art . Cabaret Mechanical Theatre was started in 1979 in Falmouth, Cornwall , where Jackson encouraged local artists Peter Markey , Paul Spooner and Ron Fuller to manufacture automata for her craft shop, "Cabaret". The shop became an exhibition space and

812-559: Is provided by a dedicated print room located within the museum. Murals or mosaics often remain where they have been created ( in situ ), although many have also been removed to galleries. Various forms of 20th-century art, such as land art and performance art , also usually exist outside a gallery. Photographic records of these kinds of art are often shown in galleries, however. Most museums and large art galleries own more works than they have room to display. The rest are held in reserve collections , on or off-site. A sculpture garden

870-870: Is reflected in the names of institutions around the world, some of which are considered art galleries, such as the National Gallery in London and Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin , and some of which are considered museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo . The phrase "art gallery"

928-557: Is similar to an art gallery, presenting sculpture in an outdoor space. Sculpture has grown in popularity with sculptures installed in open spaces on both a permanent and temporary basis. Most larger paintings from about 1530 onwards were designed to be seen either in churches or palaces, and many buildings built as palaces now function successfully as art museums. By the 18th century additions to palaces and country houses were sometimes intended specifically as galleries for viewing art, and designed with that in mind. The architectural form of

986-502: Is to shape identity and memory, cultural heritage, distilled narratives and treasured stories. Many art museums throughout history have been designed with a cultural purpose or been subject to political intervention. In particular, national art galleries have been thought to incite feelings of nationalism . This has occurred in both democratic and non-democratic countries, although authoritarian regimes have historically exercised more control over administration of art museums. Ludwig Justi

1044-677: The British Museum was established and the Old Royal Library collection of manuscripts was donated to it for public viewing. In 1777, a proposal to the British government was put forward by MP John Wilkes to buy the art collection of the late Sir Robert Walpole , who had amassed one of the greatest such collections in Europe , and house it in a specially built wing of the British Museum for public viewing. After much debate,

1102-972: The Cabaret Mechanical Theatre of London . AVAM artists, the museum boasts, include “farmers, housewives, mechanics, the disabled, the homeless. . . all inspired by the fire within.” The museum's Main Building features three floors of exhibition space, and the campus includes a Tall Sculpture Barn and Wildflower Garden, along with large exhibition and event spaces in the Jim Rouse Visionary Center. The museum has no staff curators, preferring to use guest curators for its shows. Rather than focusing shows on specific artists or styles, it sponsors themed exhibitions with titles such as Wind in Your Hair and High on Life . The museum's founder, Rebecca Alban Hoffberger , takes pride in

1160-772: The Guggenheim Museum in New York City by Frank Lloyd Wright , the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao by Frank Gehry , Centre Pompidou-Metz by Shigeru Ban , and the redesign of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art by Mario Botta . Some critics argue these galleries defeat their purposes because their dramatic interior spaces distract the eye from the paintings they are supposed to exhibit. Museums are more than just mere 'fixed structures designed to house collections.' Their purpose

1218-552: The Guggenheim Museum , the Cleveland Museum of Art , the Metropolitan Museum of Art , and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art . There are relatively few local/regional/national organizations dedicated specifically to art museums. Most art museums are associated with local/regional/national organizations for the arts , humanities or museums in general. Many of these organizations are listed as follows: Cabaret Mechanical Theatre Cabaret Mechanical Theatre

SECTION 20

#1732765407838

1276-698: The Musée du Louvre during the French Revolution in 1793 as a public museum for much of the former French royal collection marked an important stage in the development of public access to art by transferring the ownership to a republican state; but it was a continuation of trends already well established. The building now occupied by the Prado in Madrid was built before the French Revolution for

1334-648: The Renwick Gallery , built in 1859. Now a part of the Smithsonian Institution , the Renwick housed William Wilson Corcoran 's collection of American and European art. The building was designed by James Renwick Jr. and finally completed in 1874. It is located at 1661 Pennsylvania Avenue NW. Renwick designed it after the Louvre's Tuileries addition. At the time of its construction, it

1392-553: The mystification of fine arts . Research suggests that the context in which an artwork is being presented has significant influence on its reception by the audience, and viewers shown artworks in a museum rated them more highly than when displayed in a "laboratory" setting Most art museums have only limited online collections, but a few museums, as well as some libraries and government agencies, have developed substantial online catalogues. Museums, libraries, and government agencies with substantial online collections include: There are

1450-544: The 17th century onwards, often based around a collection of the cabinet of curiosities type. The first such museum was the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford , opened in 1683 to house and display the artefacts of Elias Ashmole that were given to Oxford University in a bequest. The Kunstmuseum Basel , through its lineage which extends back to the Amerbach Cabinet , which included a collection of works by Hans Holbein

1508-633: The 18th century. In Italy, the art tourism of the Grand Tour became a major industry from the 18th century onwards, and cities made efforts to make their key works accessible. The Capitoline Museums began in 1471 with a donation of classical sculpture to the city of Rome by the Papacy , while the Vatican Museums , whose collections are still owned by the Pope, trace their foundation to 1506, when

1566-401: The 1970s, a number of political theorists and social commentators have pointed to the political implications of art museums and social relations. Pierre Bourdieu , for instance, argued that in spite the apparent freedom of choice in the arts, people's artistic preferences (such as classical music, rock, traditional music) strongly tie in with their social position. So called cultural capital is

1624-516: The American Visionary Art Museum. Her then-husband, LeRoy Hoffberger, a Baltimore lawyer, businessman, and AVAM co-founder, sold items from his collection of German Expressionist art to fund the museum. With the support of her friends and family, Hoffberger petitioned the city of Baltimore and was awarded two buildings near the city's Inner Harbor worth $ 1.1 million. The State of Maryland issued $ 1.3 million in bonds to finance

1682-711: The Baltimore cultural landscape (including the Hughes Family Outdoor Theater, the LeRoy Hoffberger Speaker's Corner, and more). AVAM's Flicks from the Hill Outdoor Movie Series was included in Travel + Leisure magazine's list of "World's Best Free Stuff." Further, the magazine also cited AVAM as one of the "10 Places to See Before You're 10." AVAM has a long history of programs and practices intended to better

1740-670: The Marxist theory of mystification and elite culture . Furthermore, certain art galleries, such as the National Gallery in London and the Louvre in Paris are situated in buildings of considerable emotional impact. The Louvre in Paris is for instance located in the former Royal Castle of the ancient regime , and is thus clearly designed with a political agenda. It has been argued that such buildings create feelings of subjugation and adds to

1798-536: The Younger and purchased by the city of Basel in 1661, is considered to be the first museum of art open to the public in the world. In the second half of the 18th century, many private collections of art were opened to the public, and during and after the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars , many royal collections were nationalized, even where the monarchy remained in place, as in Spain and Bavaria . In 1753,

American Visionary Art Museum - Misplaced Pages Continue

1856-433: The active lending-out of a museum's collected objects in order to enhance education at schools and to aid in the cultural development of individual members of the community. Finally, Dana saw branch museums throughout a city as a good method of making sure that every citizen has access to its benefits. Dana's view of the ideal museum sought to invest a wider variety of people in it, and was self-consciously not elitist. Since

1914-418: The art world. The large auction houses, such as Sotheby's , Bonhams , and Christie's , maintain large online databases of art which they have auctioned or are auctioning. Bridgeman Art Library serves as a central source of reproductions of artwork, with access limited to museums, art dealers , and other professionals or professional organizations. There are also online galleries that have been developed by

1972-499: The average for an art museum. AVAM is seeking to raise a $ 25 million endowment before “exploring the many offers to establish a West coast branch.” Hoffberger has said that “a good museum does more than just have objects that stand there on pedestals. The great ones are all muse-based, connecting viewers to the heart of inspiration.” AVAM's educational goals are another example of the museum's unorthodoxy. They are: These same goals were adopted by The Lower East Side Girls Club when it

2030-414: The canon of art history . In her inaugural address, Hoffberger stated that “the American Visionary Art Museum opens its doors of perception not in an effort to make war on academic or institutionalized learning, but to create a place where the best of self-taught, intuitive contributions of all kinds will be duly recognized, explored, and then championed in a clear strong voice.” Since its designation—by

2088-997: The collection moved to Covent Garden , central London, in 1984, remaining there until 2000 when rising rates forced it to close. Part of the Cabaret Mechanical Theatre collection can be seen at the American Visionary Arts Museum in Baltimore, Maryland . Three machines made by Tim Hunkin , which were formerly part of the Covent Garden display, have been moved to Hunkin's own exhibition Novelty Automation in Holborn , London. 51°30′42″N 0°07′20″W  /  51.5118°N 0.1223°W  / 51.5118; -0.1223 This article about an organisation in England

2146-616: The community. In 1997, several of AVAM's few full-time employees were hired directly from local homeless shelters. The murals which constitute the Museum's exterior walls were created and installed by members of AVAM's youth-at-risk and youth-incarcerated mosaic apprenticeship program in 2000. AVAM sponsors Baltimore artistic events, including art car events and the annual East Coast Championship Kinetic Sculpture Race . In 2010, AVAM started an After School program in collaboration with nearby Federal Hill Preparatory School, giving students access to

2204-401: The construction. Hoffberger also relied heavily on contributions and donations, raising $ 7 million in six years from donors such as Anita Roddick . Designed by architects Rebecca Swanston and Alex Castro, the museum officially opened to the public on November 24, 1995. Visionary artists Gerald Hawkes and Vollis Simpson were the first people to step through the doors. In collaboration with

2262-704: The entire building solely intended to be an art gallery was arguably established by Sir John Soane with his design for the Dulwich Picture Gallery in 1817. This established the gallery as a series of interconnected rooms with largely uninterrupted wall spaces for hanging pictures and indirect lighting from skylights or roof lanterns . The late 19th century saw a boom in the building of public art galleries in Europe and America, becoming an essential cultural feature of larger cities. More art galleries rose up alongside museums and public libraries as part of

2320-689: The event's founder, Hobart Brown , AVAM brought the Kinetic Sculpture Race to the East coast in 1999 as an annual event. In 2004 the museum opened its third building, the Jim Rouse Visionary Center, converted from a former whiskey warehouse. The Jim Rouse Visionary Center houses such items as Kinetic Sculptures from AVAM's annual race, Baltimore painted screens, Leonard Knight's “Love Balloon,” DeVon Smith's “World’s First Robot Family,” and an interactive display of automata from London's Cabaret Mechanical Theatre . It also features two classrooms and

2378-509: The fact that AVAM is "pretty un-museumy". The founder and director of the AVAM is Rebecca Alban Hoffberger, who while working in the development department of Sinai Hospital's (Baltimore) People Encouraging People (a program geared toward aiding psychiatric patients in their return to the community) began to develop the idea for a visionary museum, an idea that eventually blossomed into the American Visionary Art Museum, or AVAM. Initially, Hoffberger

American Visionary Art Museum - Misplaced Pages Continue

2436-491: The founder of the Newark Museum , saw the traditional art museum as a useless public institution, one that focused more on fashion and conformity rather than education and uplift. Indeed, Dana's ideal museum would be one best suited for active and vigorous use by the average citizen, located near the center of their daily movement. In addition, Dana's conception of the perfect museum included a wider variety of objects than

2494-421: The get-go” in keeping with the 7 tenets of the museum's “Sure-Fire Recipe for Enchantment." Art museum An art museum or art gallery is a building or space for the display of art , usually from the museum 's own collection . It might be in public or private ownership, be accessible to all, or have restrictions in place. Although primarily concerned with visual art , art museums are often used as

2552-558: The grander English country houses could be toured by the respectable for a tip to the housekeeper, during the long periods when the family were not in residence. Special arrangements were made to allow the public to see many royal or private collections placed in galleries, as with most of the paintings of the Orleans Collection , which were housed in a wing of the Palais-Royal in Paris and could be visited for most of

2610-851: The idea was eventually abandoned due to the great expense, and twenty years later, the collection was bought by Tsaritsa Catherine the Great of Russia and housed in the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg . The Bavarian royal collection (now in the Alte Pinakothek , Munich) was opened to the public in 1779 and the Medici collection in Florence around 1789 (as the Uffizi Gallery). The opening of

2668-468: The largest category of art museums in the country. While the first of these collections can be traced to learning collections developed in art academies in Western Europe, they are now associated with and housed in centers of higher education of all types. The word gallery being originally an architectural term, the display rooms in museums are often called public galleries . Also frequently,

2726-523: The municipal drive for literacy and public education. Over the middle and late twentieth century, earlier architectural styles employed for art museums (such as the Beaux-Arts style of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City or the Gothic and Renaissance Revival architecture of Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum) succumbed to modern styles , such as Deconstructivism . Examples of this trend include

2784-816: The museum's collections and art workshop offerings. In October 2012, some pieces made by these students were auctioned off to benefit the Children's Home in Catonsville. AVAM expanded the program to a series of free workshops, called The Institute for Visionary Explorers, in the Enoch Pratt Free Library in 2012. AVAM was also the site of the inaugural Steps for the Cure, a breast cancer awareness event and fundraiser. As of 2015, AVAM has hosted 20 annual "mega-exhibitions," all of which “take one grand spirited theme that has inspired or bedeviled humankind from

2842-584: The public a decade later in 1824. Similarly, the National Gallery in Prague was not formed by opening an existing royal or princely art collection to the public, but was created from scratch as a joint project of some Czech aristocrats in 1796. The Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. is generally considered to have been the first art museum in the United States. It was originally housed in

2900-462: The public display of parts of the royal art collection, and similar royal galleries were opened to the public in Vienna , Munich and other capitals. In Great Britain, however, the corresponding Royal Collection remained in the private hands of the monarch, and the first purpose-built national art galleries were the Dulwich Picture Gallery , founded in 1814 and the National Gallery, London opened to

2958-581: The recently discovered Laocoön and His Sons was put on public display. A series of museums on different subjects were opened over subsequent centuries, and many of the buildings of the Vatican were purpose-built as galleries. An early royal treasury opened to the public was the Green Vault of the Kingdom of Saxony in the 1720s. Privately funded museums open to the public began to be established from

SECTION 50

#1732765407838

3016-563: The social elite were often made partially accessible to sections of the public, where art collections could be viewed. At the Palace of Versailles , entrance was restricted to people of certain social classes who were required to wear the proper apparel, which typically included the appropriate accessories, silver shoe buckles and a sword , could be hired from shops outside. The treasuries of cathedrals and large churches, or parts of them, were often set out for public display and veneration. Many of

3074-399: The traditional art museum, including industrial tools and handicrafts that encourage imagination in areas traditionally considered mundane. This view of the art museum envisions it as one well-suited to an industrial world, indeed enhancing it. Dana viewed paintings and sculptures as much less useful than industrial products, comparing the museum to a department store. In addition, he encouraged

3132-452: The untamed emotions resonating in it.” Hoffberger described the museum as “the best, the most imaginative, the most original museum” and soon adopted the idea of “l'art brut” for her own visionary museum. In 1987, Hoffberger and Baltimore curator George Ciscle held an exhibit titled “American Outsider Art" in Ciscle's 1006 Morton St. gallery, at which point she formally announced her plans for

3190-563: Was for example dismissed as director of the Alte Nationalgalerie (Old National Gallery) in Berlin in 1933 by the new Nazi authorities for not being politically suitable. The question of the place of the art museum in its community has long been under debate. Some see art museums as fundamentally elitist institutions, while others see them as institutions with the potential for societal education and uplift. John Cotton Dana , an American librarian and museum director, as well as

3248-410: Was founded in 1996. At the time of the museum's 1995 opening, it had been reported that Hoffberger's rejection of academic scholarship and her refusal to follow tradition perhaps had upset prominent members of the art world. Despite this, the museum won the support of collectors, critics, and the public through its exhibitions that examine the relationship of art to the human condition rather than to

3306-629: Was known as "the American Louvre". University art museums and galleries constitute collections of art developed, owned, and maintained by all kinds of schools, community colleges, colleges, and universities. This phenomenon exists in the West and East, making it a global practice. Although easily overlooked, there are over 700 university art museums in the US alone. This number, compared to other kinds of art museums, makes university art museums perhaps

3364-620: Was simply interested in the artwork created by the patients in the People Encouraging People program, and found herself “impressed with their imagination” and looking to “their strengths, not their illnesses.” Hoffberger found inspiration on a visit to the Collection de l'art brut in Lausanne , Switzerland, which was established by French artist Jean Dubuffet as a collection of “l'art brut” or “raw art because of

#837162