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Daily Art Moment: Édouard Vuillard

Image description: Vuillard, Interior, Mother and Sister of the Artist, 1893, oil on canvas. This painting is crowded with busy patterns and two women looking out towards the viewer. The young woman on the left wears a hunter green, yellow and white plaid dress and is leaning against the wall while bending forward at the waist as if to stay in the painting. The wall behind her is patterned of many colored splotches including white, crimson, yellow and dark green. Despite competing patterns the young woman almost blends into the wall, save for her pale face and hands. An older woman is seated on a chair in the middle of the space. She is wearing an all black dress and her pale face and hands offer contrast. The rug beneath them is a tan color and appears to have a subtle pattern to it. At the back of the room, in the corner, is a warm brown wooden dresser with drawers and on the far right of the scene, next to the seated woman is a round table covered with a brown, yellow, orange and cream patterned tablecloth. On top of the table sits a large wine bottle, an empty white plate and a crumpled white napkin.
Édouard Vuillard (French, 1868–1940), Interior, Mother and Sister of the Artist, 1893. Oil on canvas; 463 x 56.5 cm. The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Gift of Mrs. Saidie A. May, 141.1934.

Artist Édouard Vuillard found inspiration from the people closest at hand, as seen in our current special exhibition, Private Lives: Home and Family in the Art of the Nabis, 1889–1900. Vuillard’s mother, Madame Marie Vuillard, was a constant in her son’s life and in his art. More than 500 paintings in which she is depicted,…  Read more

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Write Around PAM: Pierre Bonnard

Image description: Family Scene. Pierre Bonnard. 1892. Color lithograph on paper. Image: 21.7 x 26. 7cm; Sheet: 27.9 x 39.6 cm. This lithograph features a tightly cropped view of three members of the artist’s family: his father, his sister, and between the two, the infant grandson. Against a flat tan background, the older man on the left appears in partial profile with just one ear and part of one eyeglass lens visible. His curling white and beige hair, which grows at the side of his bald head, trails out of the frame. His thick white beard adds texture to the print, in contrast to the flat black and tan clothing that is barely visible in the lower left-hand corner. The baby is the main focus of the piece. His round, hairless head has upward slanting almond-shaped eyes, a pug nose, and a mouth opened in a small “O.” Both chubby hands are curled in fists and his white swaddling gown encircles his head from the level of the eyes and continues flowing downward and off to the right side. The baby’s mother grips him with her left hand. Only her outstretched arm and part of her head are shown along the right side of the piece with the rest of her body disappearing out of the frame. Her head, filling the upper right corner of the print, shows both eyes, her nose, and a lock of hair rendered in heavy black paint.
Pierre Bonnard, Family Scene, 1892. Color lithograph on paper. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Acquired through the Lillie P. Bliss Bequest (by exchange), 570.1951. Digital image c The Museum of Modern Art / Licensed by SCALA / Art Resource. NY. 2021 Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris.

As the current Private Lives exhibition makes clear, the Nabis artists loved depicting children. Not only were they part of the artists’ intimate family circles, but children also offered an example of how to view the world with a fresh perspective. Drawing inspiration from Pierre Bonnard’s Family Scene, we invite you to write from the…  Read more

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Queen Nefertari’s Egypt Viewing Guide

Goddesses and Queens Queen Nefertari’s Egypt features many representations of goddesses—from the large sculptures of Sekhmet and Mut in the introductory gallery to small amulets and mirrors decorated with the face of the goddess Hathor. Sometimes ancient Egyptian queens took on the status of goddesses after their deaths, as in the case of Queen Ahmose-Nefertari,…  Read more

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Daily Art Moment: Private Lives

Image descriptions: 1. Pierre Bonnard, Child with Lamp. Lithograph on cream paper of a young child playing with toys on a small red table with a lamp. The background consists of of a rose pink color with dark brownish green hatched lines. The light-skinned child with rose pink hair is wearing a white shirt with blue dots. The child grasps the edge of the table with their left hand and rests their right arm on top of the table. The child’s head is tilted to the right and faint, loose brown lines make up the child’s facial features. The child holds red and blue toy stagecoaches. The lamp in front of the child has a dark green cylindrical base and a large dark blue shade that has a cream strip on top with a repeated pattern of dark blue x’s. A round dark green fixture holds the shade at the top and a white pole extends up out of the shade. Red and blue organic lines radiate from the white pole layered over the rose background.
Pierre Bonnard (French, 1867–1947), Child with Lamp, ca. 1897. Color lithograph on China paper; image: 33 x 44.9 cm. Museum Purchase: Ella M. Hirsch Fund, 41.11.6

After resetting the clocks and settling in for a dark winter, I am reminded of the many scenes of lamplight in the exhibition Private Lives: Home and Family in the Art of the Nabis, 1889–1900. Families gathered around oil lamps, candles, or the hearth in tenebrous Parisian apartments. Each artist in the exhibition brought a…  Read more

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Daily Art Moment: Lynnette Haozous

Image descriptions, clockwise from left: 1. A collage of three photos showing the artist Lynette Haozous and her assistant, Andrew Benally working on a mural. The first photo takes up the space on the left and features Haozous standing on a motorized lift painting the eye of a partially painted figure on the museum wall. Haozous stands on the red lift facing left, her right hand holding a brush touching the wall. Haozous is a Native American woman with dark hair swept back into two braids. She wears a gray sleeveless top and jeans with a dark shirt tied around her waist and black sneakers. A pot of blue paint sits at her feet. The mural taking shape on the wall portrays the head and shoulders of a larger-than-life figure with long hair in blue and gray. The figure is set against a bright yellow background with a halo-like shape around the head. Light blue four, pointed stars with white circle in their centers surround the figure. Two more photos are stacked on the right. 2. The top features the mural in progress with a table, ladder, and motorized lift in front of it. The mural’s central figure is the head and shoulders of a figure with long straight hair rendered in blues and grays. The figure gazes directly ahead, with facial features and clothing rendered in light blues on white. A darker blue halo is around the head within a much larger bright yellow organic cloud-like shape. Layered over this are light blue four-pointed stars in rows on either side of the figure. To the left of the figure, four dark blue, pyramid shaped triangles outlined in white are stacked on top of one another. The top and bottom triangles have large white dots in their centers and the middle two have red dots. To the right of the figure are four more pyramid shaped triangles, this time with red center dots and standing on their sides. The floor beneath the mural is covered with drop cloths. 3. The final photo at bottom right shows the artist and her assistant in the foreground with the completed mural in the background. Assistant Andrew Benally, a Native American man, stands at left, smiling. His hair is pulled back and he wears a black t-shirt with a figure in white wearing a feathered headdress. The artist Lynnette Haozous, stands at right, also smiling at the camera off to the right. She wears her hair back in braids, a plaid shirt and peach t-shirt. Behind them the mural is displayed next to a window with natural light.

Last week was an exciting week at the museum with artist Lynnette Haozous, and her assistant Andrew Benally, here from Albuquerque, New Mexico. They were on hand to install Into the Sun, her temporary mural in the gallery for our upcoming exhibition, Mesh.” As a muralist, Haozous is often invited to create work that is…  Read more

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Daily Art Moment: Pierre Bonnard

Image description: Pierre Bonnard, The Square at Evening, 1899, Color lithograph on cream paper, 16 x 20 ⅞ in. A large group of people walk through the square alongside stage coaches in front of large buildings with bright light shining from the windows. Heavy, layered strokes make up the images with details that are difficult to differentiate. A light-skinned woman wearing a black cape, large black hat with feathers protruding from the top, and red bows in her hair faces away from the viewer and takes up a two-thirds of the bottom of the lithograph. To the right a tall, thin, light-skinned man with a mustache and black coat and hat walks towards the left side of the lithograph. Behind him a shorter, thin woman with light skin looks downward and carefully steps forward while wearing a long black dress and a black hat. Yellow light reflects in the puddles around her. Behind her to the right two stage coaches drive off the paper. A large group of figures that cannot be distinguished mill about in front of the lighted windows of the large buildings. Four windows on the second floor are illuminated with reddish orange lights.

After a hot, dry, summer, I cheered the recent return of rain to Portland. More than 100 years ago, French artist Pierre Bonnard captured the magic of a rainy night in Paris. In the foreground, a woman with a plumed hat trimmed with red flowers moves to the right. Behind her, another parisienne gingerly steps…  Read more

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Daily Art Moment: Shirley Gittelsohn

Shirley Gittelsohn (American, 1925–2015), Family Portrait, 1977, oil on linen, 72 in x 144 in, Gift of the Families of Shirley Gittelsohn and Ernest Bonyhadi. Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon, 2017.49.1

Shirley Gittelsohn’s Family Portrait is featured in the current exhibition, Portraiture from the Collection of Northwest Art. The painting depicts her adult children, the family pets, her relaxed husband, herself, and their Cannon Beach gathering place. I’ve been drawn to different details of this piece over time, most recently focusing on Gittelsohn’s self-portrait. She is…  Read more

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Daily Art Moment: Pierre Bonnard

Image description: Dogs, Pierre Bonnard, lithograph on paper, image: 14 5/8 in x 10 1/4 in; sheet: 14 7/8 x 10 15/16 inches. A portrait-oriented work featuring seven dogs engaged in different canine social activities and a horse and carriage in the distance. The bottom half of the scene contains five of the dogs, each breed and type depicted in black outline. At lower right, a scruffy coated dog with a beard lifts a hind leg and urinates. Above, a large dog with a shaggy coat rendered with short vertical black strokes inspects the back end of another large smoother coated dog with a pointed snout. At center, a small black dog crouches and looks left next to a white outlined dog that resembles a rabbit with its long ears flying back and its back rounded as if in the act of pouncing. In the upper half of the print, a small white dog at left, gives a play bow to the small black dog. Its rump is raised with his head is low with front paws spread wide. At top center, a horse and closed carriage with a driver are seen at a distance. A small spotted dog walks next to the carriage and mimics the hunched, posture of both the horse and the top hatted driver. The background is flecked and dappled with black marks and smudges giving texture. At bottom center is the artist’s signature in pencil. Above it at left, is a “P” overlapping a “B” in black.
Pierre Bonnard (French, 1867–1947), “Dogs,” 1893, lithograph on paper, Museum Purchase: Jean Y. Roth Memorial Fund, 2018.46.1 © artist or other rights holder

As we enter the dog days of summer, I offer you seven pups by French artist Pierre Bonnard. Bonnard was a keen observer of animals, whether pampered pets or urban strays. In this lively lithograph, five dogs interact on an urban street. Well-groomed pets wearing collars mix with scruffy street dogs. Bonnard captures the distinctive…  Read more

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Write Around PAM: Ansel Adams

Image description: Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico, Ansel Adams, 1941, (negative) printed later, gelatin silver print. A black and white, landscape photograph showing a moon in a dark night sky over mountains, a church and graveyard. The photo is divided roughly in half with the top portion holding the dark, almost black sky. Towards the center of the work the sky lightens, and wispy clouds stretch across the photo. An almost full moon sits just left of center in the lighter sky above the light gray clouds. A snow-peaked mountain range sits under the clouds with scrubland below it. At far left a pueblo-style church with steep flat walls rises in the foreground topped with a small white cross. Low lying outbuildings and trees continue across to the right side of the photo where they meet with a cluster of crosses and headstones. Each cross is slightly different, and all seem to reflect the light and show up brightly against the darker background. Dark scrubby bushes continue to the bottom of the photograph.
Ansel Adams (American, 1902–1984), Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico, 1941; print date: 1965–75, Photograph, gelatin silver print, 2018.2730, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, The Lane Collection © The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust, Courtesy Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Ansel Adams took this photograph on the side of the highway, after glancing out the window while driving. It has since become one of his most famous pieces. We invite you to use it as inspiration in your own writing today. First, think of a moment when you were out in the world and caught…  Read more

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Write Around PAM: Ansel Adams

Image Description: Cemetery Statue and Oil Derricks, Long Beach, California. Ansel Adams. 1939. Photograph, gelatin silver print. Square black and white photo of a statue of a female with flowing wavy hair parted in the middle and gently falling onto her shoulders. Her eyes are closed and she has a peaceful, but solemn expression on her face. The figure is wearing a flowing robe-like garment with several ripples and folds. Her chin is gently resting on the folded fingers of her right hand and her elbow is resting on her knee. Her right foot and toes peek out from under the robe. She holds a wreath of daisy-like flowers in her left hand as it rests on her lowered left knee. The sculpture is on a cement pedestal that is partially visible with rounded corners decorated with filigrees. The figure seems illuminated while the evergreen trees, fifteen oil derricks, and sky in the background are much darker.
Ansel Adams (American, 1902–1984), Cemetery Statue and Oil Derricks, Long Beach, California, 1939, Photograph, gelatin silver print, 2018.2572, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The Lane Collection. © The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust. Courtesy, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

In addition to grand sweeping vistas, Ansel Adams spent time photographing the urban landscapes surrounding his home. This weekend, we invite you to spend some time closer to the city, writing within this place. Take a moment to imagine standing where Adams did when he took this photograph. What do you notice? What if you…  Read more