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This joyful retrospective of Florine Stettheimer-Jazz Age poet, a determined designer, extraordinary stylist, painter of modern life - opens with Family Portrait II (1933) in which Stettheimer portrays herself, her two sisters and her mother In an environment that is a sleek, sleek part of New York's rooftop look. Three giant flowers, one for each of the girls, overcome their composition: Their threads are confused strongly in a symbolic evocation of uninterrupted family ties. However, the artist stays away: Wearing a black pants, she occupies a seat inside and without the sanctuary of her family. This reference to the status of Stettheimer's foreigners reflected her place in New York society, where, despite her wealth, she was marginalized to be both Jews and women. Like many interlopers, Stettheimer built a world of its own, populating it with some of the most interesting figures of her day .....
Florine Stettheimer, Portrait and Marcel Duchamp, 1923-1926
Photography: David Stansbury, Michele and Donald D'Amour Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, Massachusetts
Stettheimer (1871-1944) was the fourth of five children abandoned by their father at the beginning. As older brothers and sisters married, the three younger sisters - Ettie-Florine and Carrie - remained single, living with their mother, first in Europe and then in New York City. There the sisters set up an avant-garde gathering place, including Marcel Duchamp and Edward Steichen, both of whom appeared on Stettheimer's paintings ...
Florine Stettheimer, Beauty Contest: For Memory of P.T. Barnum, 1924
Photography :. Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, Connecticut
The show begins with early artistic experiments mainly influenced by Postimpressionism. Eventually, Stettheimer hit a faux-naïve style that combined Europeans. Symbolism with the flourishing of the 1920s fashion illustration. The theme that combines these influences is the artist's interest in the theater, and the exhibition includes Stettheimer's set designs, among them, her stage creations and costumes for Virgil Thomson's production 1934, Four Saints in Three Acts ...
Florine Stettheimer, Self-Portrait with Palette (Painter and Faun), no date,
Photography: Arts Properties, Avery Fine Arts Architecture Library, University of Columbia ---
A theatrical trend also informs Stettheimer's portraits, which describe its subjects surrounded by props. Duchamp curbs a car similar to Rube Goldberg, from which appears the feminine egoism of Duchamp Rrose Selavy; Great art critic Henry McBride presents as the leader of a tennis match ...
Florine Stettheimer, Spring Sale in Bendel, 1921
Photography: Philadelphia Museum of Art--
However, Stettheimer's true masterpieces were his wondrous American life interpretations, such as Spring Bendel Reconciliation (1921), her hunting ruins, and Asbury Park South (1920), which imagines Jersey otherwise divided Filled with frolicking African-Americans. Situated near the end of the show, the Beauty Contest: For Memory of P.T. Barnum (1924) describes the competition judged by Barnum himself ...
Florine Stettheimer, A Model (Nude Self Portrait), 1915
Photography: Property of Arts, Avery's Architecture and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University -
In her diary, Stettheimer wrote: "[b] eauty contests are a BLOT in something American - I believe it is life - or civilization." In her bitter yellow and free spektaklit appearance, she was not alone Artist for her time, but for our political moment.