The Des Moines Art Center

There are quite a few regional and city museums that deserve mention, and the Des Moines Art Center is definitely one. The Art Center is not only a wonderful small museum, it's also a hub of education and cultural offerings for the city. Furthermore, the buildings themselves comprise a sort of 20th century architectural history. The first was designed by Eliel Saarinen, the next addition by I.M. Pei, and the final by Richard Meier. Each is distinctive and aesthetically striking, and the entire assemblage is situated in a verdant city park. Moreover, the Art Center also owns the John and Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Park collection in downtown Des Moines, the subject of another post, perhaps, some day.

According to the Art Center website the Art Center has it's roots in the Des Moines Fine Arts Association, an organization that began with quarters in the old downtown Des Moines Library in 1916. The separate museum was the result of a bequest from James D. Edmundson in 1933. Edmundson left over half a million dollars in trust to be held for 10 years so that the assets might recover from the Depression. In 1943, the bequest had gained considerable value and Des Moines accordingly developed a modern museum of art.

Saarinen Wing, Main Entrance (photo: Rich Sanders)

The Saarinen wing was first section of the building completed in 1948, the Pei wing in 1968 and the Meier wing in 1985.

Pei Courtyard (photo: Rich Sanders)

Meier Wing from Northwest (photo: Paul Crosby)

There is quite a lot more to the Des Moines Art Center than architecture, though. The museum, while small by big city standards, has a formidable collection of contemporary paintings and sculpture. There are masterworks by George Bellows, Edward Hopper, Francis Bacon, John Currin to name a few. Sculpture by artists as diverse as Jean Arp, Constantin Brancusi, George Segal, and Robert Arneson (again, to name only a few) is a wonderful feature as well. And we haven't discussed the sculpture park downtown at all.
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Here are a few of my personal favorites in the main collection.

John Singer Sargent: "Portraits de M.E.P et de Mlle L. P.," 1881

This double portrait of the Pailleron children by John Singer Sargent is perhaps my favorite piece in the entire museum. Although I've often said that if you have to explain a painting the artist failed, the story behind this work enhances it for me. According to several sources, the little girl, whose name was Marie-Louise, wrote as an adult about the process of the portrait. Perhaps she exaggerated, or not, but she claimed to have endured more than eighty sittings as well as considerable arguments with Sargent about clothes, hair, and other things. She and Sargent didn't like one another much as a consequence of the collision of two strong personalities. When it was finished, again according to her, the artist and children were so joyful they jumped up, ran around the studio giggling and throwing things out the windows. Even a cursory look at the little girl gives us a real view into her mood and personality. The boy (Edouard) simply looks bored.

Edward Hopper: "Automat," 1927

Another favorite is "Automat," by Edward Hopper. This painting has been enormously popular over the decades since it's creation. The Art Center has loaned it countless times to other institutions, and it's been on the cover of quite a few magazines too.
Again, especially for younger people, a bit of explanation and analysis may be useful. The Automat chain were cafeteria-like restaurants that featured no waiters and generally no waiting for food. A bank of small windowed doors displayed various items from slices of pie to soup and entree items. So in a sense the Automat was an isolating yet urban experience back then. The woman here is well-dressed but alone. She's only taken off one glove (it's obviously winter), and she's chosen a seat near the heater but in the window. The narrative here, as in much of Hopper's work, is vague and prompts a lot of questions. Is she waiting for someone? Is she lonely? Why is she alone at all? For me this picture is endlessly engaging as I try to figure it out and of course, never will. The other thing I enjoy about this work is the composition, particularly the implication of deep space Hopper gives us by showing the reflection of more than half a dozen ceiling lamps. Hopper did that kind of spatial sleight of hand in quite a number of his works. For me, the painting evokes loneliness and isolation and a curious sort of branching, invented narrative. Is she having a quick cup of coffee before facing something (or someone)? Is she alone in life, or only temporarily? Is she waiting for someone? The best art, for me, makes me wonder.

Robert Arneson: "Klown," 1978, ceramic sculpture

Another favorite of mine in the Art Center collection is a piece named "Klown," by Robert Arneson. Arneson was a long-time art teacher at several levels, all the while developing his own oeuvre of ceramic pieces that qualify as sculpture. In many, including this one, the features are a self-portrait. His work is notable for its ironic humor as well as more serious content. In Klown he may be satirizing himself as ridiculous since he wasn't taken seriously as an artist, at least in the beginning. After all, ceramics was and is widely seen as a craft, its practitioners makers of items for use. Nonetheless, you can see Arneson’s skills clearly in this piece. There are multiple, carefully-planned glazes, significant representational skill, considerable intellectual insight, and a puckish sense of the ridiculous on clear display. I love seeing this one every time. 

Francis Bacon: "Study After Velazquez' Pope Innocent X", 1953

This painting, by the famous British artist Francis Bacon (1909-1992), is formally titled "Study after Velazquez' Portrait of Pope Innocent X," but most people call this one and others in the series The Screaming Pope. This is oil on raw linen, done in Bacon's slashing and spare style. This particular work is very well-known, probably the most famous of the lot, and even has it's own Wikipedia page. This is a fairly large work, probably nearly six feet in height, as are a number of very similar iterations in widely scattered places. Bacon obsessed for years, according to many, over the Velazquez portrait of Pope Innocent X, which was said to be so lifelike that the subject himself couldn't stand to see it. Bacon apparently never did, but instead worked from photographs of the other very famous work. The Velazquez painting is in Rome, in the collection of the Pamphilij family but open to public view. In the meantime, I'm happy Des Moines has the Screaming Pope. There are any number of interesting sites and articles to be found, but the Phaidon article on Bacon's screaming popes is worth a look.

Now for a piece I've tried to like (likewise the artist's other work) without success. The picture is

Philip Guston: "Friend--to MF," 1978

"Friend--to MF" by Philip Guston (1913-1980), painted in 1978. It's said to be a portrait of Morton Feldman, a friend of Guston. The Art Center entry about this piece says the oversize ear is a nod to Feldman's career as a composer. This piece is huge at something like five and half feet tall by over seven feet long. And it's just awful. Although Feldman was said to be a big man and did smoke, this image obviously isn't a likeness. Nor is it, strictly representational, even. Guston was an Abstract Expressionist who went into more representational work in late years. But he had no hand for it, in my opinion, if this work is any indication. Certainly the only reaction I've been able to muster when I see it is bewilderment. It doesn't evoke any emotional response, nor does it have anything in the way of technical elan to recommend it. Instead it is clumsy, uncertain, and a vast failure for me anyway. Guston, of course, was respected and collected artist of the last century, considered a true master by many. 

George Bellows: "Aunt Fanny," oil on canvas, 1920

Finally, I need to mention George Bellows' tender portrait of his aunt. Many are more familiar with his boxing pictures, but Bellows painted portraits, cityscapes, and landscapes too. Among his masculine and brawny works, this portrait "Aunt Fanny," seems a bit out of character. Bellows was clearly a great painter, though, whatever the motif, and this portrait is a great example. In the sitter's face, expression, and hands, he rivals Hals, in my opinion. It is also a truly insightful rendering of old age, and simply a wondeful painting. 

The museum, though small, is a real gem. The Art Center has a wide-ranging collection of  other, mostly 20th century artists (including Iowa native Grant Wood), as well as the usual suspects in contemporary art museums large and small: Picasso, Oldenburg, Rothko, Motherwell, Roy Lichtenstein, and George Segal among others. The majority of the works held by the Art Center are top-notch, but of course there is the occasional clinker and oddball. For example, the museum has a Goya and a rather drab Monet, two rather unusual paintings to find among the modernists and contemporaries.The museum has an extensive collection of prints, many of which are on display from time to time, as well as a number of sculptures at the museum itself. (Also in the sculpture park downtown, which will have to be the subject of another post some day.) And as is the case in most museums, the Art Center often hosts interesting traveling exhibitions or interesting museum-curated shows. 

If you're in central Iowa and have a couple of hours, the Des Moines Art Center is a great way to spend them. And it's free.