TRAVEL: Upcoming Arts Events in Pennsylvania Cities

Upcoming Arts Events in Pennsylvania Cities

By Jorge Jefferds February 17, 2015

For arts lovers, the coming months offer spectacular surprises. If you plan on visiting these cities in Pennsylvania, you won’t want to miss the following events.

Palmer Museum of Art (State College)

From February 3 through May 10, the gallery is displaying one of the most remarkable works of Spanish Romantic painter Francisco Goya. Los Caprichos form part of an 80 etchings album. This collection came to be known, as a means of exposing the social, political, and religious abuses and superstitions that had for too long paralyzed Spain. For Goya personally, Los Caprichos was a financial disaster. In the four years that it was on the market, only 27 of the 300 sets were sold. Deeply in debt, Goya was obliged in 1803 to donate the plates, together with the remaining portion of the edition, to the Crown in order to secure a pension for his sole surviving son, Javier. Today the album stands, along with the writings of Cervantes and the paintings of Velázquez, as one of the foremost cultural contributions in Spanish history. This exhibition features a superb early first edition set, being one of four etchings acquired directly from Goya by the Duke and Duchess of Osuna in early 1799, several weeks before the subscription announcement in Diario de Madrid. Also included are examples from Goya’s other print series, and several reflections on the Caprichos by American artists Edward Hagedorn, and Enrique Chagoya. Francisco Goya: Los Caprichos was organized by Landau Traveling Exhibitions, Los Angeles, in association with Denenberg Fine Art, West Hollywood, California.

Philadelphia Museum of Art (Philadelphia)

Kano painting is on exhibit until May 10. The exhibition, called “Ink and Gold: Art of The Kano," explores the stunning artistry of the esteemed Kano painters, the most enduring and influential school of painting in Japanese history. Established in the late fifteenth century, the Kano lineage of artists served as painters-in-attendance to Japan’s powerful shoguns for four hundred years. The display presents more than 120 works of art spanning the school’s long and illustrious history, including large-scale, gold leaf folding screens and sliding doors as well as ink paintings, hanging scrolls, and folding fans. Ink and Gold is the first outside Japan—and the first anywhere since 1979—to so fully examine the Kano painters’ legacy.

Penn Museum (Philadelphia)

"Beneath the Surface: Life, Death, and Gold in Ancient Panama," is the most impressive event taking place in the Penn Museum these days. In 1940, the museum team unearthed an extraordinary ancient burial site in Panama. View the burial as never seen before: through a to-scale installation highlighting a vast array of grave goods as they were found. Share the mystery and explore the dazzling artifacts left behind by the enigmatic Coclé people. Learn about the famous excavation and the sophisticated, yet mysterious, Coclé people who lived, died, and painstakingly buried their dead more than 1,000 years ago. See more than 200 amazing objects—intricate gold chest plaques, beaded necklaces, finely carved pendants, painted ceramic pots, bowls, and plates—excavated from the grave of a Coclé “Paramount Chief.”

Carnegie Museum of Art (Pittsburgh)

“Sketch to Structure” (until August 17) is an inside look at the architectural design process with over 100 original objects. The exposition unfolds them to show how buildings take shape. With sketches, plans, blueprints, renderings, and models from the Heinz Architectural Center collection, this display reveals that architectural design, from initial concept to client presentation, isn’t straightforward. Beautiful hand-drawn sketches by Lorcan O’Herlihy show an architect quickly capturing ideas about shapes and color. Pencil drawings of the Los Angeles County Hall of Records by Richard Neutra show a master draftsman at work. And watercolors by Steven Holl for a client’s home render in beautiful detail, on a single sheet of paper, the planned building exterior, floor plan, and elevation. Through these and other objects from every stage of the design process, “Sketch to Structure” presents the ingenious ways that architects and firms accumulate ideas and whittle them down, ultimately solving design challenges for their clients.

The Andy Warhol Museum (Pittsburgh)

“Someday is Now: The Art of Corita Kent” is currently on display until April 19. This is the first full-scale survey covering more than 30 years of work by the American artist, Corita Kent (1918-1986). In her rich and varied career, she was a designer, teacher, feminist, and activist for civil rights and anti-war causes. Her thousands of posters, murals, and signature serigraphs reflect these combined passions for faith and politics. Kent became one of the most popular graphic artists of the 1960s and ‘70s, and her images remain iconic symbols that address the larger questions and concerns of that turbulent time and continue to influence many artists today.

While several exhibitions have focused on Corita’s work from the ‘60s, “Someday is Now”, is the first major museum show to survey her entire career, including early abstractions and text pieces as well as the more lyrical works made in the 1970s and 1980s. The exhibition also includes rarely shown photographs Corita used for teaching and documentary purposes.