Art Travel

Renovation Underway, But Art At The Wadsworth Atheneum Still Captivates

Pablo Picasso's 1934 work, The Painter, is on display at the Wadsworth Atheneum. (Laura Espinoza Jara/YJI)
HARTFORD, Connecticut, U.S.A. – The Wadsworth Atheneum, a place to see important art since 1842, showcases a variety of works.
Currently under renovation, much of the museum’s artwork is unavailable to visitors, but there is still plenty to see.
The Wadsworth’s contemporary art exhibit featured provocative pieces like the 1992 Daisy Chain by Kiki Smith.
The steel and cast bronze sculpture of a heavy chain with body parts as “charms” attached to it, represents the artist’s perspective on rape and domestic violence, issues that were at the time prevalent in the media.

The 1972 color photograph collection Untitled (Glass on Body Imprints) by Ana Mendieta, is the artist’s statement about the unrealistic expectations of beauty and fashion that often bring women to abuse and manipulate their bodies.

The 1992 work, Daisy Chain, by Kiki Smith. (Mugdha Gurram/YJI)

A temporary exhibit that showcased painter Peter Blume’s life work, stood out. It features pieces such as Tasso’s Oak from 1960 and Eternal City, which document the different sights Blume saw in his travels.
Visitors get to see the progression of the artist’s work through smaller, detailed “studies,” or drafts, displayed next to his finished work. It
provided an interesting window to the way Blume worked.
The museum’s Amistad Center is showing the temporary exhibit, This is My Story, This is My Song: Writers, Musicians and the Black Freedom Struggle that focuses on the work of black authors and musicians – including Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. Du Bois and Duke Ellington – who used their influence in the Civil Rights Movement.
A grand re-opening of the entire museum, complete with free admission, is Saturday, Sept. 19.
Laura Espinoza Jara, Mary Majerus-Collins and Mugdha Gurram are Reporters for Youth Journalism International.
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