Exhibition Features Contemporary Artworks Gifted to the Jewish Museum from The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation

New York, NY, November 30, 2022—The Jewish Museum will present After “The Wild”: Contemporary Art from The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation Collection, an exhibition highlighting contemporary artworks by 47 intergenerational and internationally based artists made between 1963 and 2022. These works are part of a larger gift to the Museum in 2018 comprising artworks made by the recipients of The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation Award (see below for the list of artists). After “The Wild”: Contemporary Art from The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation Collection will be on view at the Jewish Museum from March 24 through October 1, 2023.

Barnett Newman (1905-1970) is among the most influential artists associated with Abstract Expressionism. Largely overlooked by critics, curators, and collectors until his later years, he was nonetheless a stalwart and generous supporter of his colleagues, befriending and mentoring countless younger artists. To them, Newman appeared not as an old master but as a true peer—curious, engaged, and as eager to delve into the nuances of technique as to art’s philosophical underpinnings. After his death, Annalee Newman, his widow, created The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation to help further the spirit of great art that Barnett Newman so clearly exhibited, by giving grants. Diverse in style, training, background, and age, the Foundation’s grantees—whose works comprise this exhibition—share Newman’s seriousness of purpose, as well as his unflagging drive to explore the outer limits of his own ideas.

The exhibition title is inspired by Barnett Newman’s 1950 painting The Wild. Standing at 8 feet tall and a mere 1 ½ inches wide, the work consists of a dark orange “Zip” set against razor thin bands of black. It contrasts sharply with the heroically scaled paintings for which Newman is well known. In Newman’s own account, The Wild was meant to test whether something modest could hold its own against something grand: in its first presentation, it was shown opposite the painting Vir Heroicus Sublimis (1950-51), a room-filling magnum opus. 

After “The Wild”: Contemporary Art from The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation Collection is organized by guest curator Kelly Taxter, with Shira Backer, Leon Levy Associate Curator, The Jewish Museum. Exhibition design is by Ivi Diamantopoulou and Jaffer Kolb, New Affiliates. 

 

The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation Grantees

Larry Bell, American, b. 1939

Amnon Ben-Ami, Israeli, b. 1955

Lynda Benglis, American, b. 1941

Natvar Prahladji Bhavsar, American, b. India 1934

Mark Bradford, American, b. 1961

Richard Van Buren, American, b. 1937

Luca Buvoli, Italian, b. 1963

Tony Cragg, British, b. 1949

Ronald Wendel Davis, American, b. 1937

Richard Deacon, British, b. Wales, 1949

Melvin Edwards, American, b. 1937

Rafael Ferrer, Puerto Rican, b. 1933

Mark Gibian, American, b. 1954

Sam Gilliam, American, 1933-2022

Cai Guo-Qiang, Chinese, b. 1957

Peter Halley, American, b. 1953

Tim Hawkinson, American, b. 1960

Michael Heizer, American, b. 1944

Eva Hild, Swedish, b. 1966

Rebecca Horn, German, b. 1944

Bryan Hunt, American, b. 1947

Richard Howard Hunt, American, b. 1935

Theo Jansen, Dutch, b. 1948

Joan Jonas, American, b. 1936

Mel Kendrick, American, b. 1949

Anne Lilly, American, b. 1966

Andrew Lyght, American, b. Guyana, 1949

Kerry James Marshall, American, b. 1955

Julie Mehretu, American, b. Ethiopia, 1970

Robert Murray, Canadian and American, b. 1936

Serge Alain Nitegeka, South African, b. Burundi, 1983

David Novros, American, b. 1941

Frank Owen, American, b. 1939

Gary Petersen, American, b. 1956

Judy Pfaff, American, b. England, 1946

Larry Poons, American, b. Japan, 1937

Nuno Ramos, Brazilian, b. 1960

Nancy Rubins, American, b. 1952

Richard Serra, American, b. 1939

Richard Smith, British, 1931-2016

Keith Sonnier, American, 1941-2020

Sarah Sze, American, b. 1969

Philip Taaffe, American, b. 1955

Fred Tomaselli, American, b. 1956

Elizabeth Turk, American, b. 1961

Terry Winters, American, b. 1949

Jack Youngerman, American, 1926-2020

Alexander Yulikov, Russian, b. 1943 (Yulikov's work is not available for this exhibition)

 

Programs

Programs will include a series of artist interviews, conversations, and art-making workshops inspired by the exhibition.

 

Audio Tour

The exhibition will be accompanied by an audio tour available within the Jewish Museum’s digital guide on Bloomberg Connects, the free arts and culture app. Bloomberg Connects is accessible for either onsite or offsite visits and can be downloaded to any mobile device. Download the free app.

 

Catalogue

The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation collection will be the subject of a forthcoming catalogue.

 

Support

This exhibition is made possible by The Barnett and Annalee Newman Foundation. 

Digital guide supported by Bloomberg Connects.