For art lovers, 2019 promises a dazzling array of museum exhibitions, truly an embarrassment of riches. From London to Los Angeles and everywhere in-between and beyond, there are a lot of shows to look forward to. If we could use someone else’s air miles to jet to these cities, here are some of the shows we’d like to see:
Tintoretto: Artist of Renaissance Venice at the National Gallery of Art
Courtesy of the Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venice
March 10 – July 7
Jacopo Tintoretto has never had a retrospective in North America. As if to make up for that, this show involves almost 50 paintings plus a dozen drawings that have never been seen before in the U.S. Hopefully the show will prove worthy of this master painter. We’re hearing this show might be postponed because of the Trump shutdown, furloughed employees had to work without pay to take down the previous show.
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Oscar Rejlander: Artist Photographer at the Getty Center
Courtesy of The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
March 12 – June 9
This exhibition of 150 works from Swedish born, U.K.-based Oscar Rejlander (1813- 1875) include his masterpiece, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872), which he created by exposing 30 negatives then collaging them together to print a single picture. Rejlander helped change the perception of photographers, elevating them from mere camera operators to that of artists.
J. Paul Getty Museum, Getty Center, Los Angeles, CA
Early Rubens at the Legion of Honor Museum
Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art
April 6 – Sept. 8
Peter Paul Rubens was a superstar almost right out of the gate. By his early 30s he’d already racked up patrons from the European aristocracy, and created a body of work that would solidify his place in the art world. This Legion of Honor Museum show has more than 30 paintings and 20 works on paper, including some of Rubens’ notable large-scale, life-size paintings, on loan from institutions across Europe and the U.S.
The Legion of Honor, San Francisco, CA
Lincoln Kirstein’s Modern at the Museum of Modern Art
2018 Walker Evans Archive, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
March 17 – June 30
Most people have never heard of Lincoln Kirstein, curator, collector, and writer. Though this show, perhaps you can know Kirstein through his friends – this show has works from Walker Evans, paintings by Pavel Tchelitchew, costume designs by Paul Cadmus for ballets he commissioned, and Latin American art that Kirstein acquired for MoMA, including works by Antonio Berni and Raquel Forner. Fun fact: Kirstein co-founded the New York City Ballet and was one of the “monuments men” who went into Europe to save Nazi-confiscated art.
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Garry Winogrand: Color at the Brooklyn Museum
The Estate of Garry Winogrand, courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco
May 3 – Aug. 18
Winogrand (1928–1984) is famous for his black and white snapshots of midcentury New York, but his color photography of the same subjects—commuters, teens, high society, and everything in-between—is more obscure. The Brooklyn Museum is putting on the first ever dedicated exhibition of Winogrand’s color photography, which hasn’t been exhibited significantly since 1967, with more than 450 images displayed as slide projections.
Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, N.Y.
The Venice Biennale’s 58th International Art Exhibition
Photographer: Picture Alliance
May 11 – Nov. 24
Ah, the Biennale. Where every two years much of the art world congregates for what’s been called a World’s Fair for the art scene. In the city’s formal gardens, countries fill their pavilions with contemporary art in a showy display of national prestige. So which way is the Freedonia pavilion?
The Venice Biennial, Venice, Italy
Manet and Modern Beauty at the Art Institute of Chicago
Mr. and Mrs. Lewis Larned Coburn Memorial Collection
May 26 – Sept. 8
First, we love the Art Institute. Second, Edouard Manet is probably the greatest portraitist of the 19th century (don’t @ me). The Art Institute is putting on a show of his works, with 54 paintings and 90 works in total, drawn in part from its permanent collection. The art will be supplemented with letters Manet sent to friends, which he illustrated with pictures of fruit and flowers. Third, we love any excuse to visit and eat our way through Chicago.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Nam June Paik: The Future is Now at the Tate Modern
Estate of Nam June Paik
Oct. 17 – February 9, 2020
An exhibition devoted to video art might not have the popular appeal of, say, a Michelangelo blockbuster, but Nam June Paik, the so-called father of the medium, knew how to put on a show. His art isn’t just videos on screens. It’s often sculptures—weird, confusing, occasionally very large sculptures, including a room-sized installation—in which videos and televisions feature heavily. Much of Paik’s art is half a century old, but visitors will discover that almost all of it feels surprisingly current.
The Tate Modern, London, UK
What did we miss? What exhibitions are you looking forward to seeing in 2019?