Printmaking styles on display

By Victoria Gail-White
Special to The Advertiser

•	'European Modernism, 1860-1930: Prints from the Academy's Collection' 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays 1 to 5 p.m. Sundays Through June 20 Graphic Arts Gallery Honolulu Academy of Arts 'Art & Life in Paris and the Countryside' Through July 31 Education Wing Gallery

Rarely shown because of their sensitivity to light, 30 works on paper by masters of European modernism brighten the Graphic Arts Gallery. Drawn from the art museum's collection of Western graphic arts and employing a range of printmaking techniques, they show signature-like sketching, the artists' pictorial handwriting, in their distillation of simple line and composition.

In the etchings, drypoints, color lithographs and woodcuts on display, we are given an exceptional opportunity to see the skeletons and mark-making that lie beneath some of the luscious paintings in the "Japan and Paris" exhibit.

Generally unencumbered by the emotional charge of color, many of these works call attention, like black-and-white photographs, to the potency of their imagery. And some prints clearly illustrate how the artists integrated aspects of "things Japanese" (which most of them probably first discovered in France's Universal Exposition of 1867) into their compositions.

"Head of a Woman" (1905), a small etching by Pablo Picasso, is a perfect portrayal of gentle countenance. It appears straightforward and feminine, so unlike many of Picasso's stronger portrayals of the human form. The endearing feeling it evokes is reminiscent of the expression on the faces of the refined geisha in the ukiyo-e prints in the "Influencing Paris: Japanese Prints Collected by European Artists."

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was so influenced by Japanese woodblock prints of the "Floating World" that he used the concept and aspects of ukiyo-e in a newly invented lithographic process to create a floating world of his own — prints of cabarets, cafes, horse racing, music and dance halls and singers in France. "May Milton" (1895), a color lithograph, is a fine example of how the Japanese elements inspired his work: the rake of the floor, the patterning, and his signature monogram evocative of a Japanese seal.

The same can be said of Eugene Grasset's color lithograph "La Vitreoleuse (the Vitriol Thrower)." Akin to a woodcut of a Japanese ghost story, the subject's face is as green as the poisonous thoughts that bubble in her bowl, unhealthy and frightening.

"Manao Tupapau (She Is Hunted by a Spirit)" is one of the woodcuts featured in Paul Gauguin's published journal of Tahiti, "Noa Noa."

Edgar Degas' pastel on paper "Woman Sponging Her Back" acquaints us with how the artist changed his mind and repositioned the arm in the golden yellow glow of this composition.

Wonderful prints by impressionists Pierre Auguste Renoir, Mary Cassatt and ƒdouard Manet; postimpressionists Paul Cézanne and Paul Signac; Nabi artist Pierre Bonnard and Fauvists Raoul Dufy and Henri Matisse (among many others) give this exhibit its own muscle and our eyes a real work-out.

If you haven't seen the blockbuster "Japan and Paris" exhibit, you might want to begin by venturing downstairs to the Education Wing Gallery for a lively and enjoyable orientation. If you have seen the main exhibit and have somehow missed this companion display, it is worth a trip back to the museum. It is a playground of impressionism.

Fortunately, this interactive exhibit is designed for adults and children alike, although only adults were having fun there when I visited.

In the front room, touching a big blue button triggers a light and starts an audio that expounds on the lives of a handful of impressionist painters.

The next room features a white, wooden architectural model of the Cathedral of Rouen (made by Richard Duggan). One can play with the light switches and change the color and the angle of the lighting. The objective here is to demonstrate how the light and shadow, at different times of day, changed the mood of one of Monet's favorite subjects.

The visual display puts the impressionist era in an easy-to-understand historical and cultural context. Chronologically arranged, more than a hundred wonderful photographs and narratives sprawl through several rooms and explore the evolution of impressionism through headings such as traditional styles of painting, path of study, the official salon, Paris in conflict, independence from the salon, photography and the printed word, the outdoor studio, urban expansion, the cafes, cabarets, theater, countryside, Parisians at play, Japonisme and the impressionist exhibitions.

Interactive games are waiting on three computers (one game this reviewer enjoyed was Claude Monet: "The Magician of Color"), as well as a plethora of books scattered on the tables that one can peruse, including children's books such as "Katie Meets the Impressionists" by James Mayhew.

A large magnet game matches the painting to the painter — to acquaint one with recognizing the individual styles of different impressionist painters.

The painting studio, a room of its own, is complete with an art teacher, still life, easels, free paper, paint and paintbrushes. It gives adults and children a chance to paint their own masterpieces. The studio will be more accessible this summer, open all day long (Tuesdays through Sundays) until the exhibit closes the end of July.

"The painting studio has been a very popular part of this exhibit," says Betsy Robb, assistant curator of education. "Last Sunday, four or five hundred people were painting in the studio."

Admission to the Academy of Arts is free the third Sunday of every month, courtesy of the Bank of Hawaii and The Advertiser. The next free Sunday, June 20, will feature a Medieval Faire from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The education department also supplies hands-on "Keiki Kits" at the front desk with activities (gallery treasure hunts, puzzles, art projects and prizes) that relate to the museum's collections.