2013

Sol LeWitt: Wall Drawings 790A and 790B: Irregular Alternating Color Bands

Sol LeWitt’s Wall Drawings 790A and 790B: Irregular Alternating Color Bands(1995) fill the Hartmann Gallery with serpentine bands of bold color applied directly to the wall. A pioneer of Conceptual Art, LeWitt conceived his wall drawings as a medium through which he could explore the concept of serial permutation while mining the tension between art and architecture.Wall Drawings 790A and 790B, like most of LeWitt’s wall drawings, exist only for the duration of the exhibition before being destroyed, privileging the conception of the work over its physical manifestation and demonstrating the artist’s dictum that “The idea becomes a machine that makes the art.” Still, the physical form of the work retains an undeniable beauty: LeWitt’s sinuous line and fulsome color together serve as an arresting counterpoint to Eliel Saarinen’s airy interior space.

Vision and Interpretation: Building Cranbrook, 1904–2012

"Vision and Interpretation: Building Cranbrook, 1904-2012" presents the architectural legacy of Cranbrook as an artistic narrative emerging from the visionary ideas of George Gough Booth. During the early 1900s, Booth’s vision was realized through collaborations with renowned architects and craftsmen, including Albert Kahn and Eliel Saarinen. More recently, the campus has been interpreted by contemporary designers offering contrasting and complementary projects on the National Historic Landmark site. "Vision and Interpretation" is a collaboration between Cranbrook Art Museum and Cranbrook Archives.

Soo Sunny Park: Vapor Slide

Also opening on November 17, 2012 and running through Sunday, March 17, 2013 is sculptor Soo Sunny Park’s large-scale installation SSVT (South Stafford, Vermont) Vapor Slide (2007). The exhibit combines quotidian materials – chain link fence, plastic cups, paper clips, river rocks – in imaginative ways, crafting a dazzling environment of ethereal light and space. Park, a 2000 alumna of Cranbrook Academy of Art's Sculpture Department, created the work in response to the undulating, snowy hills of South Strafford, Vermont. The installation uses chain link fence, a conventional boundary demarcation, to fashion a space through which viewers move rather than as a method of impeding access. In doing so, SSVT (South Strafford, Vermont) Vapor Slide becomes a spellbinding meditation on the interstitial spaces we encounter every day and the myriad possibilities hidden within. Born in Seoul, South Korea, Soo Sunny Park moved to the United States of the age of eleven and ...

2013 Graduate Degree Exhibition of Cranbrook Academy of Art

What happens when emerging architects, artists, and designers get together and throw themselves a party? Find out at the “2013 Graduate Degree Exhibition,” one of the largest and most exciting exhibitions of art and design in the country, opening on April 21 at Cranbrook Art Museum. The annual Degree Show of Cranbrook Academy of Art is the culmination of two years of studio work at the nation’s top-ranked independent graduate school of architecture, art and design. This is the same show that launched the careers of Florence Knoll, Harry Bertoia, Massamichi Udagawa, Anne Wilson, Hani Rashid, Nick Cave, Tony Matelli, Ed Fella, Lorraine Wild, Martin Venezky, Beth Katleman, Sonya Clark, and many more. The exhibition takes place in almost 15,000 square feet of galleries at Cranbrook’s historic Eliel Saarinen designed Art Museum. The Museum has recently undergone a $22 million renovation and expansion that is creating one of the most significant exhibition ...

From the Archives: Teaching and Exhibiting Painting at Cranbrook, 1930-1970

The Cranbrook Academy of Art painting department was instrumental in shaping the artistic lives of hundreds of students through graduate student studio work, public exhibitions, and youth programs. Drawing entirely from the collections of the Cranbrook Archives, this exhibition is comprised of selections of historic photographs, exhibition announcements and catalogs, press releases, and artists’ correspondence. Highlights include the role Cranbrook painters played in the New Deal arts programs in the 1930s and 1940s, creating numerous murals for public buildings throughout Michigan.

Michigan Modern: Design that Shaped America

In Michigan, industry and design intertwined creating an epicenter of modern design. Michigan’s visionaries touched nearly every aspect of American life. Detroit’s automobile manufacturers didn’t just produce automobiles; they styled them to become synonymous with the American dream. The state’s furniture manufacturers didn’t just manufacture furniture; they revolutionized the look of the American office and home. Michigan architects Albert Kahn, Eero Saarinen, and Minoru Yamasaki didn’t just design buildings; they defined an era. Michigan’s industry, prosperity, and educational institutions created a synergy that attracted the design talent that formed the foundation for modern American design. This exhibition celebrates Michigan’s outstanding contributions to Modern design and the stories of the people who made it happen. For more information about the Michigan Modern project, click here. Michigan Modern: Design that Shaped America is organized by the Michigan State Historic Preservation Office in association with Cranbrook Art Museum and curated by MPdL Studio. A symposium ...

Anders Ruhwald at Saarinen House: The Anatomy of a Home

Anders Ruhwald- Saarinen House Exhibitions

For his first solo exhibition in Michigan, Danish ceramist Anders Ruhwald will present a series of “site-sensitive” installations in Saarinen House, the “total work of art” designed by the Finnish American architect Eliel Saarinen in 1930. Saarinen House, which Cranbrook Art Museum operates as a historic house museum, will provide the ideal backdrop for Ruhwald’s continued investigations into the nature of Modernism—specifically Scandinavian Modernism—and will serve to heighten the dialogue that his work promotes within the overlapping fields of art, craft, and design. Ruhwald serves as an Artist-in-Residence and Head of the Ceramics Department at Cranbrook Academy of Art. Although Ruhwald has presented other site-sensitive installations in Europe, his interventions into the domestic spaces of Saarinen House, from the iconic dining room to the private rear courtyard, will allow the artist to fully explore Modernism’s construction of the everyday, and what happens to that ideal when it is frozen in time ...

From the Archives: Forging Cranbrook’s Gatescape

Cranbrook has a rich history of gate design and fabrication, beginning with George Booth’s 19th-century work as a designer for Barnum Wire & Iron Works in Windsor, Ontario. From peripheral entrance gates to interior ornamental gates executed in wood, wrought iron, cast iron and steel, over 80 gates have been installed on the campus. These gates—Cranbrook’s “gatescape”—are the focus of the second exhibition in the From the Archives series. Forging Cranbrook’s Gatescape presents the historical and contemporary uses of gates, and explores the relationship between designer and fabricator, and how the gates of Cranbrook define space and create a visual bridge between the visitor and the architecture.

A Driving Force: Cranbrook and the Car

A Driving Force: Cranbrook and the Car explores the ways in which Cranbrook has played a role in the automobile industry since the start of the twentieth century. Looking at figures such as automobile designer James Scripps Booth and Cranbrook Academy of Art graduate Suzanne Vanderbilt, the exhibition highlights how Cranbrook has helped to define the ultimate symbol of modern America: the car.

What to Paint and Why: Modern Painters at Cranbrook, 1936 – 1974

At Cranbrook Academy of Art, fundamental questions about painting emerged during the midcentury through the productive tension between the styles of its early painting instructors: Zoltan Sepeshy, a figurative painter, and Wallace Mitchell, an abstractionist. This exhibition mines the dynamic contrast between these two foundational figures in Cranbrook’s history, tracing the effects of their legacy through their own work and that of their students—several of whom went on to careers of national renown.