Petah Coyne
Untitled #1287 (Tati),
2009 Mixed media.
55 x 42 x 19 inches
© Petah Coyne.
Courtesy of the artist and
Galerie Lelong, New York.
 

The 185th Annual: An Invitational Exhibition of Contemporary American Art will feature 65 emerging and established artists selected by a jury of National Academicians. This biennial invitational is an inter-generational exhibition of non-Academicians that offers an opportunity for the public to preview new artistic directions in contemporary American art. Seen from the perspective of distinguished American artists, this national exhibition includes artists working in the New York area and the Eastern region as well as the Midwest, West Coast, and as far away as Hawaii.

Click here to read The New York Times review of the 185th Annual Invitational.

Alyssa Monks (b. 1977), Vapor,
2008, oil on linen, 60 x 40 in.,
courtesy of the artist and
DFN Gallery
 

Reconfiguring the Body in American Art, 1820-2009 examined the critical role the human figure has played in the Nation’s art for the past 189 years. Transcending chronological, stylistic, and generational boundaries the exhibition presented 160 works drawn from the National Academy’s important and wide ranging collection of American art, as well as an intriguing selection of works by contemporary artists who carried on the figurative tradition in new and adventurous ways.

Click here to read more.

The 184th Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Art

April 16 - June 10, 2009

The 184th Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Art featured 189 National Academy artist-members exhibiting their work. From figurative to abstraction, the art covered many different styles and mediums within the categories of painting, sculpture, works on paper and architectural renderings and models. This year over $55,000 in prizes was awarded. This exhibition was generously supported by a grant from the Peter Jay Sharp Foundation and with the Public Funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a State Agency. Click here to read more.

American Waters: Celebrating the 400th Anniversary of Hudson, Fulton and Champlain

February 4 - April 5, 2009

This year, New York State and its many communities are celebrating a yearlong series of events to commemorate the 400th anniversary of New York State and the dual anniversaries of the voyages of English Captain Henry Hudson and Frenchman Samuel de Champlain. Within a century of their discoveries, the waterways that now bear the names Hudson and Champlain merged into one vital corridor at the epicenter of global commerce, politics and ideas. To celebrate these simultaneous Quadricentennials – as well as the 200th anniversary of the successful maiden steamboat journey of Robert Fulton up the Hudson River– the National Academy exhibition, American Waters revealed a unique historical perspective through select paintings of rural and urban American landscapes captured by generations of American artists.
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George Tooker, b. 1920
Self Portrait, 1947
Egg tempera on gesso panel, 18in. diam.
Curtis Galleries, Minneapolis, Minnesota

George Tooker: A Retrospective

October 2, 2008 – January 4, 2009

George Tooker: A Retrospective, the artist’s first museum retrospective in three decades, provided a comprehensive examination of his place in American art and revealed the full scope of his achievements. Jointly organized by the National Academy Museum, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and the Columbus Museum of Art, the exhibition brought together approximately 60 paintings and drawings made since 1945. In many works of the 1950’s and 1960’s, Tooker examined human experiences of love, death, aging, isolation, alienation and grief. Since the 1970’s his work evinced broader humanistic notions of hope and optimism. Additionally, the exhibition contained a substantial selection of Tooker’s working drawings, rarely exhibited and largely concentrated in the collection of the Addison Gallery of America Art, allowing viewers a fascinating glimpse into the artist’s working method.