Presented at the exhibition "Modern Contemporary / Collection as a verb: Triggers" at the
Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb 04.07.2023 - 03.09.2023
Modern Contemporary builds upon the first exhibition from 1955 with which the City Gallery of Contemporary Art (today's Museum of Contemporary Art) started its exhibition activity. It was an exhibition from the holdings which presented a selection of the first acquired works.
www.msu.hr/dogadanja/moderna-s...
"When young Alfred Barr mentioned to Gertrude Stein that he will be the director of the new Museum of Modern Art, she replied: “That is nice, but I don’t understand how it can be both, museum and modern?”
Throughout the 19th century there was no distinction between “modern” and “contemporary” art. The works of art depicting scenes of contemporary life, unlike those with religious mythological themes, were considered to be modern. At that time Bouguereau, Gerome, Cabanel were important modern/contemporary artists, as well as much lesser known Van Gogh, Gauguin and Cezanne.
This changed with the 1913 New York exhibition that became known as the legendary “Armory Show,” the show at which European modernism was introduced to American public. In a way it was a specific outside view that selected a kind of art that was considered to be unusual and provocative, especially for the American public. . Two paintings of nudes, “The Blue Nude” by Matisse and “Nude Descending a Staircase” by Duchamp, produced especially great excitement and endless discussions with numerous newspaper caricatures. Since then modern became associated with shocking and provocative (“avant-garde”) art and separated from “contemporary” art. It is when Van Gogh, Gauguin and Cezanne emerged as important modern artists while Cabanel and others became forgotten.
It is worth remembering that the original name of the Armory Show was in fact the “International Exhibition of Modern Art.” Despite the fact that the works were grouped in two main sections, “American” and “Foreign,” this exhibition represented a radical departure from previous international exhibitions organized by national schools or national pavilions. One could say that this exhibition represented the beginning of the transition from a paradigm based on the notion of nationality to a new one that would be essentially international."
Kunsthistorisches Mausoleum - Belgrade