On The Late Twentieth Century Renaissance Of Minoan Bull-Jumping Painting And Sculpture

"The Corcoran is on its way to change. A new leader, brought in from far away, is clearing out cobwebs.

The glorious atrium is being renewed: Grimy marble columns are being cleaned and mismatched glass floors are being replaced.

Grand ground-floor spaces, long used as offices, are due to become galleries again.

The institution's gearing up for spring, when its whole building will be given over to a survey of modern design and art flown in from London. It will be one of the most ambitious projects in the institution's history.

And even now, while all that is going on, the museum is a very different place, more slanted toward the present and the future than toward a hallowed past of gold-framed portraits and sublime landscapes. Almost all the Corcoran's galleries have been given over to "Redefined," a reinstallation of the permanent collection that exhibits only artworks made since World War II, and mostly objects from the past 30 years" ...

Blake Gopnik "A Reframed Corcoran: Readying for New Spaces and New Views, the Museum Showcases Its Post-WWII Works" Washington Post September 12, 2006

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/12/AR2006091200267.html

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The Corcoran Gallery of Art and Corcoran College of Art and Design













Manual Neri's "Bull Jumper." 1980 Painted plaster.

Photo credit: Melina Mara and The Washington Post. With thanks.