Walker Art Center
Encyclopedia
The Walker Art Center is a contemporary art
center in Minneapolis, Minnesota
, United States
. The Walker is considered one of the nation's "big five" museums for modern art along with the Museum of Modern Art
, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
, the Guggenheim Museum
and the Hirshhorn
. It was founded in 1879 by lumberman Thomas Barlow Walker and which he formally established at its current location in 1927 as the first public art gallery in the Upper Midwest. Directly across from the museum are the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
, which opened in 1988; and the Cowles Conservatory. The Walker Art Center underwent a renovation and expanded the museum in April 2005.
, Frank Gehry
, Julie Mehretu
, Mario Merz
, and Kara Walker
. In 1995, the museum displayed the YBA showcase Brilliant!
.
The Permanent Collection is thoroughly integrated with the institution’s history. After 1958, exhibitions, commissions, and acquisitions were pursued at a much faster pace. As a result, the collections—though they encompass the whole of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries—are strongest after 1960. Many of the works in the collection were exhibited, commissioned, or discovered during studio visits. Some relationships with artists—for example, Matthew Barney
, Robert Gober
, Jasper Johns
, Ellsworth Kelly
, Sherrie Levine
, and Claes Oldenburg
—have extended over many years and encompassed multiple projects, and the collection often reflects that commitment through deep holdings that follow the shifts and turns of a whole career. In recent years the Walker has begun collecting from groups who have remained outside the traditional artistic canon. These “alternative modernisms” include Japanese Gutai
, Viennese Actionism
, Italian Arte Povera
, and Fluxus
, all of which developed during the 1950s and 1960s. It currently has an exhibit of paintings by Marsden Hartley("Roses")("Maine Coastal Stillife")some of which are part of the Walker's permanent collection. In its permanent collection there are also works by: Cindy Sherman, Jeanne Dunning, Kiki Smith, Lucas Samaras ("Reconstruction"), Alex Katz, Charles Sheeler and Siah Armajani.
) in 1963, led by John Ludwig and dedicated primarily to contemporary American opera and unique collaborations between opera and visual artists. By the time it disbanded in 1970, the CAC had already presented Merce Cunningham’s first Minnesota performance (1963) and established its first artist commission, Alwin Nikolais’
Vaudeville of the Elements (1965). Performing Arts was officially designated as a department in 1970.
Throughout the 1970s, the department sponsored events in a range of venues around the Twin Cities, increasing the visibility of contemporary dance, new music, jazz, and experimental theater and hosting an array of pop, rock, and folk concerts. The Walker launched significant program initiatives and established key relationships with a range of artists now considered masters—Cunningham, Mabou Mines
, Philip Glass
, Twyla Tharp
, Meredith Monk
, and many others—that continue today.
In 1973, the Film/Video Department was officially formed and the Edmond R. Ruben Film and Video Study Collection was established, along with an endowment to fund the development of the archive. Ruben, a leading figure in film exhibition in the Upper Midwest, and his wife Evelyn believed in collecting films as a way of preserving the art form. Today, with more than eight hundred fifty titles, the Ruben Collection brings together classic and contemporary cinema as well as documentaries, avant-garde films, and video works by artists. It is distinctive for its holdings by visual artists that range from classics by Salvador Dali
, Marcel Duchamp
, and Fernand Léger
to extensive contemporary work by William Klein
, Derek Jarman
, Bruce Conner
, Marcel Broodthaers
, Nam June Paik
, and leading experimental artists who challenged the form and content of film, such as Paul Sharits
and Stan Brakhage
.
Additionally, the department organizes design-related projects and programs, such as lectures, exhibitions, and special commissions. Over the course of its 60-plus year history, the department has organized many important exhibitions on architecture and design, and has served as a vital forum for contemporary design issues, bringing hundreds of world-renowned architects, designers, and critics to the Twin Cities.
, an online database of Minnesota artists and organizations that provides a digital gathering place for the local arts community. Through a partnership with the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Walker manages ArtsConnectEd, an online resource for arts educators that draws from both institutions’ permanent collection resources.
. Each division offers programs and activities in visual art, performing arts, film/video, new media, design, and architecture. To inform these undertakings, the staff work with Walker curators and partners from local organizations, artists, schools, and community groups. Advisory groups such as the Walker Art Center Teen Arts Council, Tour Guide Council, and the Parent Advisory Group are also implemented in the department for the Walker to further build relationships with its audience.
. In 2005, an expansion designed by Herzog & de Meuron
opened that doubled the size of the museum and added new galleries, a restaurant, and a 385-seat theater.
The Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
, a collaboration between the Walker and the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board, is a sculpture park on the north side of the Walker Campus.
, Henry Moore
, Alberto Giacometti
, and others.
During the 1960s, the Walker organized increasingly ambitious exhibitions that circulated to museums in the United States and abroad. The permanent collection expanded to reflect crucial examples of contemporary artistic developments. Concurrently, Performing Arts, Film, and Education programs grew proportionately and gained their own national prominence throughout the next three decades.
Opened in April 2005, the new expansion nearly doubled the size of the Walker Art Center. The expansion, designed by Herzog & de Meuron
includes increased indoor and outdoor facilities, allowing for a better usage of resources from objects in the permanent collection to books in the library to an inside view of the artist's own creative process.
A key aspect of the design is a "town square," a sequence of spaces that draw people for informal conversation, interactive learning, and community programs.
Today, the Walker is recognized internationally as a singular model of a multidisciplinary arts organization and as a national leader for its innovative approaches to audience engagement.
Timeline
1879 - Lumberer baron Thomas Barlow (T.B.) Walker opens the first public art gallery west of the Mississippi at his residence on Hennepin Avenue in Downtown Minneapolis
1927 - Walker Art Galleries opens in Minneapolis, on the current Walker Art Center site.
1940 - Funded by 1939 Works Projects Administration (WPA) grants, Walker Art Galleries becomes the Walker Art Center. Under its first Director, Daniel Defenbacher, it began to add modern and regional art to the eclectic collection gathered by T. B. Walker. It opens to the public with exhibitions Ways to Art, Parallels in Art, and Trends in Contemporary Art, signaling its new interest in Modern Art
. Defenbacher and his wife Louise Walker Defenbacher collaborated on Design Quarterly, which showcased good modern design in housewares and furniture.
Spring Dance Festival, organized by Gertrude Lippincott, is the first performance event at the Walker
1942 - Franz Marc
, Die grossen blauen Pferde (The Large Blue Horses) (1911) is the Walker's first acquisition of Modern Art.
1946 - Everyday Art Gallery, curated by Hilde Reiss, opens as the first exhibition space dedicated for design in a U.S. museum. Everyday Art Quarterly (later renamed Design Quarterly) begins publication as the first U.S. museum journal on design.
1948 - Edward Hopper
, Office at Night
(1940) acquired.
1950 - Walker art school closed. Defenbacher replaced as Director by H. Harvard Arnason .
1954 - Georgia O’Keeffe, Lake George Barns (1926) is acquired.
1963 - Walker Art Center establishes the Center Opera Company, which later becomes the Minnesota Opera
.
Guthrie Theater
opens adjacent to the Walker.
John Cage
, with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company
, presents first Walker performance.
1964 - Dominick Argento's
Masque of Angels performed by the Center Opera Company as first Performing Arts commission.
1967 - Andy Warhol
16 Jackies (1964) acquired.
1969 - Major acquisitions include Chuck Close
, Big Self-Portrait (1967–1968)
1970 - Performing Arts Department is formed.
1971 - New Walker Art Center opens, designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes
.
1972 - Film/Video Department is established.
1976 - The Walker becomes a public institution; T.B. Walker Foundation establishes museum endowment.
1978 - Laurie Anderson
performs as part of the Perspectives series, copresented with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra
.
Summer Music & Movies in Loring Park
begins.
1988 - Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
opens, designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes
. Commissioned works include Claes Oldenburg
and Coosje van Bruggen's
Spoonbridge and Cherry (1985–1988)
1989 - Out There series of experimental performance art and theater begins.
1990 - Regis Dialogues, a series of film retrospectives and interviews with noted filmmakers and actors, begins with Clint Eastwood
and James Ivory
.
1992 - Minneapolis Sculpture Garden expansion opens.
1996 - New Media Initiatives Department is formed with Gallery 9, a web site for net art, launches with Piotr Szyhalski, Ding an sich (The Canon Series) (1997), the first new-media commission.
1998 - Charles Ray
, Unpainted Sculpture (1997) acquired.
Art Performs Life: Merce Cunningham
/Meredith Monk
/Bill T. Jones
, a multidisciplinary exhibition, celebrates the Walker's long-term relationships with the artists.
ArtsConnectEd, a web site featuring the collections of the Walker and the Minneapolis Institute of Art, launches.
2002 - mnartists.org
, a joint project of the Walker and the McKnight Foundation
, launches.
2005 - Newly expanded Walker Art Center, designed by Herzog & de Meuron
, opens in April.
Contemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
center in Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis , nicknamed "City of Lakes" and the "Mill City," is the county seat of Hennepin County, the largest city in the U.S. state of Minnesota, and the 48th largest in the United States...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. The Walker is considered one of the nation's "big five" museums for modern art along with the Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is a modern art museum located in San Francisco, California. A nonprofit organization, SFMOMA holds an internationally recognized collection of modern and contemporary art and was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th century art...
, the Guggenheim Museum
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is a well-known museum located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, United States. It is the permanent home to a renowned collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, early Modern, and contemporary art and also features special exhibitions...
and the Hirshhorn
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is an art museum beside the National Mall, in Washington, D.C., the United States. The museum was initially endowed during the 1960s with the permanent art collection of Joseph H. Hirshhorn. It was designed by architect Gordon Bunshaft and is part of the...
. It was founded in 1879 by lumberman Thomas Barlow Walker and which he formally established at its current location in 1927 as the first public art gallery in the Upper Midwest. Directly across from the museum are the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
The Minneapolis Sculpture Garden is an 11 acre park in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the United States.It is located near the Walker Art Center, which operates it in coordination with the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board...
, which opened in 1988; and the Cowles Conservatory. The Walker Art Center underwent a renovation and expanded the museum in April 2005.
Visual arts program
The Visual Arts program is a mix of contemporary, historical, group, monographic, thematic, and media-specific shows. Certain artists have had their first major museum exposure in Walker exhibitions, among them Joseph CornellJoseph Cornell
Joseph Cornell was an American artist and sculptor, one of the pioneers and most celebrated exponents of assemblage...
, Frank Gehry
Frank Gehry
Frank Owen Gehry, is a Canadian American Pritzker Prize-winning architect based in Los Angeles, California.His buildings, including his private residence, have become tourist attractions...
, Julie Mehretu
Julie Mehretu
Julie Mehretu is an artist, best known for her densely-layered abstract paintings and prints. She lives and works in New York City...
, Mario Merz
Mario Merz
Mario Merz was an Italian artist, and husband of Marisa Merz.-Life:Born in Milan, Merz started drawing during World War II, when he was imprisoned for his activities with the Giustizia e Libertà antifascist group. He experimented with a continuous graphic stroke–not removing his pencil point from...
, and Kara Walker
Kara Walker
Kara Walker is a contemporary African American artist who explores race, gender, sexuality, violence and identity in her work. She is best known for her room-size tableaux of black cut-paper silhouettes, such as The Means to an End--A Shadow Drama in Five Acts.-Biography:Walker was born in...
. In 1995, the museum displayed the YBA showcase Brilliant!
Brilliant!
Brilliant! was a group exhibition of contemporary art held at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, USA between 22 October, 1995 and 7 January, 1996...
.
The Permanent Collection is thoroughly integrated with the institution’s history. After 1958, exhibitions, commissions, and acquisitions were pursued at a much faster pace. As a result, the collections—though they encompass the whole of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries—are strongest after 1960. Many of the works in the collection were exhibited, commissioned, or discovered during studio visits. Some relationships with artists—for example, Matthew Barney
Matthew Barney
Matthew Barney is an American artist who works in sculpture, photography, drawing and film. His early works were sculptural installations combined with performance and video...
, Robert Gober
Robert Gober
Robert Gober is an American sculptor. His work is often related to domestic and familiar objects such as sinks, doors, and legs.-Life and work:...
, Jasper Johns
Jasper Johns
Jasper Johns, Jr. is an American contemporary artist who works primarily in painting and printmaking.-Life:Born in Augusta, Georgia, Jasper Johns spent his early life in Allendale, South Carolina with his paternal grandparents after his parents' marriage failed...
, Ellsworth Kelly
Ellsworth Kelly
Ellsworth Kelly is an American painter and sculptor associated with Hard-edge painting, Color Field painting and the Minimalist school. His works demonstrate unassuming techniques emphasizing the simplicity of form found similar to the work of John McLaughlin. Kelly often employs bright colors to...
, Sherrie Levine
Sherrie Levine
Sherrie Levine is an American photographer and appropriation artist.-Education:Levine received her B.A. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 1969. In 1973, she earned an M.F.A. from the same institution....
, and Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg is a Swedish sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects...
—have extended over many years and encompassed multiple projects, and the collection often reflects that commitment through deep holdings that follow the shifts and turns of a whole career. In recent years the Walker has begun collecting from groups who have remained outside the traditional artistic canon. These “alternative modernisms” include Japanese Gutai
Gutai group
The Gutai group was an artistic movement and association of artists founded by Jiro Yoshihara in Japan in 1954...
, Viennese Actionism
Viennese Actionism
The term Viennese Actionism describes a short and violent movement in 20th century art that can be regarded as part of the many independent efforts of the 1960s to develop "action art" . Its main participants were Günter Brus, Otto Mühl, Hermann Nitsch and Rudolf Schwarzkogler. As "actionists",...
, Italian Arte Povera
Arte Povera
Arte Povera is a modern art movement. The term was introduced in Italy during the period of upheaval at the end of the 1960s, when artists were taking a radical stance. Artists began attacking the values of established institutions of government, industry, and culture, and even questioning whether...
, and Fluxus
Fluxus
Fluxus—a name taken from a Latin word meaning "to flow"—is an international network of artists, composers and designers noted for blending different artistic media and disciplines in the 1960s. They have been active in Neo-Dada noise music and visual art as well as literature, urban planning,...
, all of which developed during the 1950s and 1960s. It currently has an exhibit of paintings by Marsden Hartley("Roses")("Maine Coastal Stillife")some of which are part of the Walker's permanent collection. In its permanent collection there are also works by: Cindy Sherman, Jeanne Dunning, Kiki Smith, Lucas Samaras ("Reconstruction"), Alex Katz, Charles Sheeler and Siah Armajani.
Performing arts
The Walker began presenting local dance, poetry, and chamber music concerts in 1940. In 1953, the volunteer-staffed Center Arts Council (CAC) was formed to organize a wider range of performances and film screenings. Out of CAC grew the Center Opera Company (later the Minnesota OperaMinnesota Opera
The Minnesota Opera is a performance organization based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was founded in 1963 by the Walker Art Center, and is known for premiering such diverse works as Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak and Frankenstein by Libby Larsen...
) in 1963, led by John Ludwig and dedicated primarily to contemporary American opera and unique collaborations between opera and visual artists. By the time it disbanded in 1970, the CAC had already presented Merce Cunningham’s first Minnesota performance (1963) and established its first artist commission, Alwin Nikolais’
Alwin Nikolais
Alwin Nikolais was an American choreographer.Nikolais studied piano at an early age and began his performing career as an organist accompanying silent films. As a young artist, he gained skills in scenic design, acting, puppetry and music composition...
Vaudeville of the Elements (1965). Performing Arts was officially designated as a department in 1970.
Throughout the 1970s, the department sponsored events in a range of venues around the Twin Cities, increasing the visibility of contemporary dance, new music, jazz, and experimental theater and hosting an array of pop, rock, and folk concerts. The Walker launched significant program initiatives and established key relationships with a range of artists now considered masters—Cunningham, Mabou Mines
Mabou Mines
Mabou Mines is an avant-garde theatre company founded in 1970 and based in New York City.-History:Mabou Mines is a collaborative, avant-garde theater company based in New York City...
, Philip Glass
Philip Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
, Twyla Tharp
Twyla Tharp
Twyla Tharp is an American dancer and choreographer, who lives and works in New York City.-Early years:Tharp was born in 1941 on a farm in Portland, Indiana, and was named after Twila Thornburg, the "Pig Princess" of the 89th Annual Muncie Fair in Indiana.she spend hours working on it to help her...
, Meredith Monk
Meredith Monk
Meredith Jane Monk is an American composer, performer, director, vocalist, filmmaker, and choreographer. Since the 1960s, Monk has created multi-disciplinary works which combine music, theatre, and dance, recording extensively for ECM Records.-Life and work:Meredith Monk is primarily known for her...
, and many others—that continue today.
Film/Video
Widely recognized for presenting a full-range of moving-image art forms, the Walker Art Center’s film and video programs feature both contemporary and historical works. In the 1940s, the Walker identified moving images (mostly movies, but also experimental films) as integral to contemporary life. Artists of that time were experimenting with film’s formal properties, such as light, motion, and sound, while also separating film art from conventional narrative cinema.In 1973, the Film/Video Department was officially formed and the Edmond R. Ruben Film and Video Study Collection was established, along with an endowment to fund the development of the archive. Ruben, a leading figure in film exhibition in the Upper Midwest, and his wife Evelyn believed in collecting films as a way of preserving the art form. Today, with more than eight hundred fifty titles, the Ruben Collection brings together classic and contemporary cinema as well as documentaries, avant-garde films, and video works by artists. It is distinctive for its holdings by visual artists that range from classics by Salvador Dali
Salvador Dalí
Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
, Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...
, and Fernand Léger
Fernand Léger
Joseph Fernand Henri Léger was a French painter, sculptor, and filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of Cubism which he gradually modified into a more figurative, populist style...
to extensive contemporary work by William Klein
William Klein
William Klein is a photographer and filmmaker noted to for his ironic approach to both media and his extensive use of unusual photographic techniques in the context of photojournalism and fashion photography...
, Derek Jarman
Derek Jarman
Michael Derek Elworthy Jarman was an English film director, stage designer, diarist, artist, gardener and author.-Life:...
, Bruce Conner
Bruce Conner
Bruce Conner was an American artist renowned for his work in assemblage, film, drawing, sculpture, painting, collage, and photography, among other disciplines.-Early life:...
, Marcel Broodthaers
Marcel Broodthaers
Marcel Broodthaers was a Belgian poet, filmmaker and artist with a highly literate and often witty approach to creating art works....
, Nam June Paik
Nam June Paik
Nam June Paik was a Korean American artist. He worked with a variety of media and is considered to be the first video artist....
, and leading experimental artists who challenged the form and content of film, such as Paul Sharits
Paul Sharits
Paul Jeffrey Sharits Paul Sharits was a visual artist, best known for his work in "experimental" or avant-garde filmmaking, particularly what became known as the Structural film movement, along with artists such as Tony Conrad, Hollis Frampton, and Michael Snow.His film work primarily focused on...
and Stan Brakhage
Stan Brakhage
James Stanley Brakhage , better known as Stan Brakhage, was an American non-narrative filmmaker who is considered to be one of the most important figures in 20th century experimental film....
.
Design
The Walker Art Center maintains a professional, in-house design and editorial department headed by Andrew Blauvelt to fulfill its various communication needs. The department is responsible for the design and editing of all printed materials, including the creation and planning of publications such as exhibition catalogues, bi-monthly magazines, and books, as well as exhibition and event graphics, signage programs, and promotional campaigns.Additionally, the department organizes design-related projects and programs, such as lectures, exhibitions, and special commissions. Over the course of its 60-plus year history, the department has organized many important exhibitions on architecture and design, and has served as a vital forum for contemporary design issues, bringing hundreds of world-renowned architects, designers, and critics to the Twin Cities.
New Media
The Walker’s New Media Initiatives group oversees mnartists.orgMNartists.org
mnartists.org is a free online arts hub with programs and daily updated information for Minnesota's artists and arts lovers. The web site hosts a database of information and artwork from more than 15,000 artists and arts organizations around the state...
, an online database of Minnesota artists and organizations that provides a digital gathering place for the local arts community. Through a partnership with the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Walker manages ArtsConnectEd, an online resource for arts educators that draws from both institutions’ permanent collection resources.
Education & Community Programs
Learning is emphasized as a core experience at the Walker through a mix of education programs, community building efforts, and interpretive projects. The department conducts community, family, interpretive, public, school, teen, and tour programs, as well as mnartists.orgMNartists.org
mnartists.org is a free online arts hub with programs and daily updated information for Minnesota's artists and arts lovers. The web site hosts a database of information and artwork from more than 15,000 artists and arts organizations around the state...
. Each division offers programs and activities in visual art, performing arts, film/video, new media, design, and architecture. To inform these undertakings, the staff work with Walker curators and partners from local organizations, artists, schools, and community groups. Advisory groups such as the Walker Art Center Teen Arts Council, Tour Guide Council, and the Parent Advisory Group are also implemented in the department for the Walker to further build relationships with its audience.
Campus
The Walker Art Center is on a 17 acre (69,000 m²) urban campus that includes both buildings and parks. The north wing of the building opened in 1971 and was designed by Edward Larrabee BarnesEdward Larrabee Barnes
Edward Larrabee Barnes was a American architect.Barnes was born in Chicago, Illinois into a family he described as "incense-swinging High Episcopalians", consisting of Cecil Barnes, a lawyer, and Margaret Helen Ayer, recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for the novel Year of Grace...
. In 2005, an expansion designed by Herzog & de Meuron
Herzog & de Meuron
Herzog & de Meuron Architekten, BSA/SIA/ETH is a Swiss architecture firm, founded and headquartered in Basel, Switzerland in 1978. The careers of founders and senior partners Jacques Herzog , and Pierre de Meuron , closely paralleled one another, with both attending the Swiss Federal Institute of...
opened that doubled the size of the museum and added new galleries, a restaurant, and a 385-seat theater.
The Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
The Minneapolis Sculpture Garden is an 11 acre park in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the United States.It is located near the Walker Art Center, which operates it in coordination with the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board...
, a collaboration between the Walker and the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board, is a sculpture park on the north side of the Walker Campus.
History
Formally established in 1927, the Walker Art Center began as the first public art gallery in the Upper Midwest. The museum's focus on modern art began in the 1940s, when a gift from Mrs. Gilbert Walker made possible the acquisition of works by important artists of the day, including sculptures by Pablo PicassoPablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
, Henry Moore
Henry Moore
Henry Spencer Moore OM CH FBA was an English sculptor and artist. He was best known for his semi-abstract monumental bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art....
, Alberto Giacometti
Alberto Giacometti
Alberto Giacometti was a Swiss sculptor, painter, draughtsman, and printmaker.Alberto Giacometti was born in the canton Graubünden's southerly alpine valley Val Bregaglia and came from an artistic background; his father, Giovanni, was a well-known post-Impressionist painter...
, and others.
During the 1960s, the Walker organized increasingly ambitious exhibitions that circulated to museums in the United States and abroad. The permanent collection expanded to reflect crucial examples of contemporary artistic developments. Concurrently, Performing Arts, Film, and Education programs grew proportionately and gained their own national prominence throughout the next three decades.
Opened in April 2005, the new expansion nearly doubled the size of the Walker Art Center. The expansion, designed by Herzog & de Meuron
Herzog & de Meuron
Herzog & de Meuron Architekten, BSA/SIA/ETH is a Swiss architecture firm, founded and headquartered in Basel, Switzerland in 1978. The careers of founders and senior partners Jacques Herzog , and Pierre de Meuron , closely paralleled one another, with both attending the Swiss Federal Institute of...
includes increased indoor and outdoor facilities, allowing for a better usage of resources from objects in the permanent collection to books in the library to an inside view of the artist's own creative process.
A key aspect of the design is a "town square," a sequence of spaces that draw people for informal conversation, interactive learning, and community programs.
Today, the Walker is recognized internationally as a singular model of a multidisciplinary arts organization and as a national leader for its innovative approaches to audience engagement.
Timeline
1879 - Lumberer baron Thomas Barlow (T.B.) Walker opens the first public art gallery west of the Mississippi at his residence on Hennepin Avenue in Downtown Minneapolis
1927 - Walker Art Galleries opens in Minneapolis, on the current Walker Art Center site.
1940 - Funded by 1939 Works Projects Administration (WPA) grants, Walker Art Galleries becomes the Walker Art Center. Under its first Director, Daniel Defenbacher, it began to add modern and regional art to the eclectic collection gathered by T. B. Walker. It opens to the public with exhibitions Ways to Art, Parallels in Art, and Trends in Contemporary Art, signaling its new interest in Modern Art
Modern art
Modern art includes artistic works produced during the period extending roughly from the 1860s to the 1970s, and denotes the style and philosophy of the art produced during that era. The term is usually associated with art in which the traditions of the past have been thrown aside in a spirit of...
. Defenbacher and his wife Louise Walker Defenbacher collaborated on Design Quarterly, which showcased good modern design in housewares and furniture.
Spring Dance Festival, organized by Gertrude Lippincott, is the first performance event at the Walker
1942 - Franz Marc
Franz Marc
Franz Marc was a German painter and printmaker, one of the key figures of the German Expressionist movement...
, Die grossen blauen Pferde (The Large Blue Horses) (1911) is the Walker's first acquisition of Modern Art.
1946 - Everyday Art Gallery, curated by Hilde Reiss, opens as the first exhibition space dedicated for design in a U.S. museum. Everyday Art Quarterly (later renamed Design Quarterly) begins publication as the first U.S. museum journal on design.
1948 - Edward Hopper
Edward Hopper
Edward Hopper was a prominent American realist painter and printmaker. While most popularly known for his oil paintings, he was equally proficient as a watercolorist and printmaker in etching...
, Office at Night
Office at Night
Office at Night is a 1940 painting by the American realist painter Edward Hopper. It is currently owned by the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota which purchased the painting in 1948....
(1940) acquired.
1950 - Walker art school closed. Defenbacher replaced as Director by H. Harvard Arnason .
1954 - Georgia O’Keeffe, Lake George Barns (1926) is acquired.
1963 - Walker Art Center establishes the Center Opera Company, which later becomes the Minnesota Opera
Minnesota Opera
The Minnesota Opera is a performance organization based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was founded in 1963 by the Walker Art Center, and is known for premiering such diverse works as Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak and Frankenstein by Libby Larsen...
.
Guthrie Theater
Guthrie Theater
The Guthrie Theater is a center for theater performance, production, education, and professional training in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the result of the desire of Sir Tyrone Guthrie, Oliver Rea, and Peter Zeisler to create a resident acting company that would produce and perform the classics in...
opens adjacent to the Walker.
John Cage
John Cage
John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, writer, philosopher and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde...
, with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company
Merce Cunningham
Mercier "Merce" Philip Cunningham was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of the American avant-garde for more than 50 years. Throughout much of his life, Cunningham was considered one of the greatest creative forces in American dance...
, presents first Walker performance.
1964 - Dominick Argento's
Dominick Argento
Dominick Argento is an American composer, best known as a leading composer of lyric opera and choral music...
Masque of Angels performed by the Center Opera Company as first Performing Arts commission.
1967 - Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
16 Jackies (1964) acquired.
1969 - Major acquisitions include Chuck Close
Chuck Close
Charles Thomas "Chuck" Close is an American painter and photographer who achieved fame as a photorealist, through his massive-scale portraits...
, Big Self-Portrait (1967–1968)
1970 - Performing Arts Department is formed.
1971 - New Walker Art Center opens, designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes
Edward Larrabee Barnes
Edward Larrabee Barnes was a American architect.Barnes was born in Chicago, Illinois into a family he described as "incense-swinging High Episcopalians", consisting of Cecil Barnes, a lawyer, and Margaret Helen Ayer, recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for the novel Year of Grace...
.
1972 - Film/Video Department is established.
1976 - The Walker becomes a public institution; T.B. Walker Foundation establishes museum endowment.
1978 - Laurie Anderson
Laurie Anderson
Laura Phillips "Laurie" Anderson is an American experimental performance artist, composer and musician who plays violin and keyboards and sings in a variety of experimental music and art rock styles. Initially trained as a sculptor, Anderson did her first performance-art piece in the late 1960s...
performs as part of the Perspectives series, copresented with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra
Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra
The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra , based in Saint Paul, Minnesota, is the United States' only full-time professional chamber orchestra...
.
Summer Music & Movies in Loring Park
Loring Park
Loring Park is the largest park in the Central Community of Minneapolis, Minnesota on the southwest corner of downtown Minneapolis. It also lends its name to the surrounding neighborhood.- Park :...
begins.
1988 - Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
Minneapolis Sculpture Garden
The Minneapolis Sculpture Garden is an 11 acre park in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the United States.It is located near the Walker Art Center, which operates it in coordination with the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board...
opens, designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes
Edward Larrabee Barnes
Edward Larrabee Barnes was a American architect.Barnes was born in Chicago, Illinois into a family he described as "incense-swinging High Episcopalians", consisting of Cecil Barnes, a lawyer, and Margaret Helen Ayer, recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for the novel Year of Grace...
. Commissioned works include Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg
Claes Oldenburg is a Swedish sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects...
and Coosje van Bruggen's
Coosje van Bruggen
Coosje van Bruggen was a sculptor, art historian, and critic. She collaborated extensively with her husband, Claes Oldenburg.-Biography:...
Spoonbridge and Cherry (1985–1988)
1989 - Out There series of experimental performance art and theater begins.
1990 - Regis Dialogues, a series of film retrospectives and interviews with noted filmmakers and actors, begins with Clint Eastwood
Clint Eastwood
Clinton "Clint" Eastwood, Jr. is an American film actor, director, producer, composer and politician. Eastwood first came to prominence as a supporting cast member in the TV series Rawhide...
and James Ivory
James Ivory (director)
James Francis Ivory is an American film director, best known for the results of his long collaboration with Merchant Ivory Productions, which included both Indian-born film producer Ismail Merchant, and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala...
.
1992 - Minneapolis Sculpture Garden expansion opens.
1996 - New Media Initiatives Department is formed with Gallery 9, a web site for net art, launches with Piotr Szyhalski, Ding an sich (The Canon Series) (1997), the first new-media commission.
1998 - Charles Ray
Charles Ray
Charles Ray was a silent film star. Extremely popular in a series of films casting him in juvenile roles, primarily rural young men, Ray's career faded as he lost his youthful looks- he also had a reputation of being demanding and having an outsized ego...
, Unpainted Sculpture (1997) acquired.
Art Performs Life: Merce Cunningham
Merce Cunningham
Mercier "Merce" Philip Cunningham was an American dancer and choreographer who was at the forefront of the American avant-garde for more than 50 years. Throughout much of his life, Cunningham was considered one of the greatest creative forces in American dance...
/Meredith Monk
Meredith Monk
Meredith Jane Monk is an American composer, performer, director, vocalist, filmmaker, and choreographer. Since the 1960s, Monk has created multi-disciplinary works which combine music, theatre, and dance, recording extensively for ECM Records.-Life and work:Meredith Monk is primarily known for her...
/Bill T. Jones
Bill T. Jones
Bill T. Jones is an American artistic director, choreographer and dancer.-Early life:Jones was born in Bunnell, Florida and his family moved North as part of the Great Migration in the first half of the twentieth century. They settled in Wayland, New York, where Jones attended Wayland High School...
, a multidisciplinary exhibition, celebrates the Walker's long-term relationships with the artists.
ArtsConnectEd, a web site featuring the collections of the Walker and the Minneapolis Institute of Art, launches.
2002 - mnartists.org
MNartists.org
mnartists.org is a free online arts hub with programs and daily updated information for Minnesota's artists and arts lovers. The web site hosts a database of information and artwork from more than 15,000 artists and arts organizations around the state...
, a joint project of the Walker and the McKnight Foundation
McKnight Foundation
The McKnight Foundation is a philanthropic organization based in Minneapolis, Minnesota in the United States. The foundation's interests lie in the environment, the arts, community development, and other areas....
, launches.
2005 - Newly expanded Walker Art Center, designed by Herzog & de Meuron
Herzog & de Meuron
Herzog & de Meuron Architekten, BSA/SIA/ETH is a Swiss architecture firm, founded and headquartered in Basel, Switzerland in 1978. The careers of founders and senior partners Jacques Herzog , and Pierre de Meuron , closely paralleled one another, with both attending the Swiss Federal Institute of...
, opens in April.
See also
- Minneapolis Sculpture GardenMinneapolis Sculpture GardenThe Minneapolis Sculpture Garden is an 11 acre park in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the United States.It is located near the Walker Art Center, which operates it in coordination with the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board...
- MNartists.orgMNartists.orgmnartists.org is a free online arts hub with programs and daily updated information for Minnesota's artists and arts lovers. The web site hosts a database of information and artwork from more than 15,000 artists and arts organizations around the state...