Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Disasters of War, Etching by Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes


During the month of December, the Karl Drerup Art Gallery of Plymouth State University will present a special exhibition of the etchings of Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes. Beginning Monday, December 3 and continuing through Friday, December 21, selections from the renowned Disasters of War series will be on display.

The works are from the collection of Hans Guggenheim, Boston based collector, professor of Anthropology, artist, and founder of Projectguggenheim, an educational initiative supporting the study and development of indigenous artistic traditions. 



Friday, November 9, 2012

Interview by World Journal - 2009



古根漢將在波士頓展畫作
波士頓訊
December 31, 2009 12:01 AM 


古根漢參觀敦煌壁畫時買下的「敦煌菩薩」布幔。 (黃子怡∕攝影


前麻省理工學院(MIT)人類學教授古根漢(Hans Guggenheim)的生活和畫作都深受中國影響,他近年曾到台灣、尼泊爾、中國旅遊,並且在中國興辦美術學校。他的作品和收藏畫作不久前在南京博物館展出,古根漢也計畫在波士頓展覽畫作。

日前親訪湖南省馬王堆漢墓,他對古長沙國的藝術和生活印象深刻。古根漢從小就被山水畫吸引,他對畫中人物渺小,而大自然占很大比例哲學感興趣。他指出,西畫恰巧相反,是人物較大,以大自然當背景。

國畫是他的興趣之一,但古根漢最擅長線條畫(linedrawing),他以美術簽字筆記錄對風景和人物的觀感。他說,用線條捕捉實物相當困難,簽字筆與鉛筆最大的不同是不能擦掉重來。古根漢表示,他沒畫錯過,作畫時也不重來。宛如他85個歲月只向前邁進而不回頭。
他在中國式的畫紙書上,以優美的線條呈現中國的山水和「玉女出征」等故事。他的自畫像是以一條線勾勒出一位幽幽地獨自喝中國茶解悶的人。幽默的古根漢拿著一張像原子彈爆炸的線條畫問,這是「香菇」還是「不朽」? 接著宣布,「這是香菇」。

古根漢家裡掛著一幅「敦煌菩薩」的布幔,這是他參觀敦煌壁畫旅居時,說服旅館主人從牆上拿下來賣給他的紀念品。原籍德國的古根漢喝烏龍茶、用端溪名硯、欣賞景德鎮陶瓷。他有許多與中國藝術生活相關的圖書,無數個茶壺,以及一桌子的毛筆、玉印,他的生活和畫作都融入了中國文化。(黃子怡)


Thursday, November 8, 2012

Publication - Love and Immortality in China

Love and Immortality in China
A Taoist Drama: Action To No Action

By Hans Guggenheim




About the Author
Hans Guggenheim (b. Berlin 1924), was educated in England and lived in Guatemala during World War II. where he had his first one-man exhibition at the Club Guatemala,1945. In New York he studied Art history at the Institute of Fine Arts (NYU) with Alfred Salmony, an expert on Chinese art, and Jose Lopez-Rey, an expert on Goya. From 1956 -1958, he traveled as an artist for LIFE magazine through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan ,India and Japan. Guggenheim’s Ph.D. dissertation in Anthropology was on National Self-Image formation in the Arts. He taught as Associate Professor of Anthropology at MIT and Visiting Scholar at Harvard’s Center for International Affairs where he did research for UNESCO. At the time of the drought in Mali to built water-granaries for the Dogon with the support of his friend Lester Wunderman. He was president of the Worldcrafts Fdt. for UNESCO and In 976 he founded Projet Guggenheim which evolved into Projectguggenheim in 1996.(www.projectguggenheim.org) . With the goal of providing opportunities for young artists and to encourage innovation as well continuity for ancient art traditions, PROJECTGUGGENHEIM established schools and programs in many countries including the Peoples Republic of China Autonomous Region of Tibet, Mali, Guatemala ,Israel, Tonga and Macedonia. 

Hans Guggenheim lives in Boston. 

Jerry Zhu Peihan met Dr.Guggenheim in 2004 when she first volunteered as an interpreter for the exhibition of the Hans Guggenheim collection of Goya’s ‘Disasters of War’ at the Nanjing Museum. Jerry Zhu Peihan was a student at the Center for International Relations of John Hopkins University in Nanjing and has continued to collaborate with Dr.Guggenheim on a wide range of projects.



Overview
Embark on an exciting expedition to China at the turbulent beginning of the Western Han Dynasty to search for Zhang Liang, a famed innovator of military strategies who metamorphosed from a would-be assassin into a Taoist immortal and for Jade, his eternally beautiful partner in love and war.

Author Hans Guggenheim has woven an enchanting tale about Love And Immortality In China that will rivet readers from beginning to end…


Product Details
       Paperback: 194 pages
       Publisher: Xlibris Corporation (November 23, 2010)
       Language: English
       ISBN-10: 1453575472
       ISBN-13: 978-1453575475

The book purchase is available on Amazon, Xlibris, Barnes & Nobel. All of the book sales will go to PROJECTGUGGENHEIM to help promote art program and education in remote areas.

Thank you for your support !

Our website :   http://www.projectguggenheim.org

Wednesday, November 7, 2012


南京迎来戈雅巨作()

(Nanjing Museum, China, 2004)

2004-12-15  来源:中华读书报 作者:特约记者 高林胜摄影/报道  查看评论 




210日,80岁的美国汉斯・古根海姆老人来到南京展示他的收藏品。这套名为《战争的灾难》的作品共81幅,内容是有关拿破仑战争期间西班牙反抗法国侵略的。此前,汉斯的这套藏品只出过一次家门,去过一次波兰――一个二战时被纳粹德国疯狂杀戮过的国家。汉斯把戈雅藏品的第二次“见光”给了南京――这个在日本侵华战争时经历了大屠杀的城市。

81幅如今市值至少在2000万美元以上的戈雅作品,已安全运抵南京博物院。和戈雅作品同时展出的,还有汉斯带来的世界战争地区和国家的儿童绘画作品,以及南京本地艺术家组织的南京儿童绘画作品。让这些儿童作品和戈雅一同出现,汉斯认为有着很特别的意义。


67th Anniversary of Nanjing Massacre

The 13th of this month marks the 67th anniversary of the Nanjing Massacre. This year, people not only pay condolence to the victims of the tragedy by visiting the Memorial Hall of the Victims, but also a special painting exhibition held by the Nanjing Museum entitled"War and Peace" which has been warmly welcomed.

As part of the exhibition, the 18th century Spanish maestro Goya's drypoints named "The Disasters of War" has been showcased in China for the first time. 

Hans Guggenheim is the collector of the works. He says that although the drypoints depict Spanish people fighting against Napoleon, and have been finished more than 2 hundred years ago, they still arouse people's shared love of peace and hatred of war. 

"I am very happy to be able to show this Goya's paintings, which show very depth of humanity together with the art of children toward our future." 

The whole set of dry points comprise 81 paintings, which are worth more than 20 million US Dollars. And visitors, especially Nanjing citizens, say they are deeply touched after seeing the exhibition. 

"As a Nanjing citizen, I think this city bears a heavy history. I sympathize with the theme of the paintings. By reproduction of war, the painter shows people's call for peace." 

Together with Goya's paintings, paintings by children living in warring regions have also been showcased in the Nanjing Museum. 

Zhou Yun, CRI News




Peace and War

( Nanjing Museum, China, 2004)


The Art of Reason
By/HANS GUGGENHEIM



Goya’s search for reason,liberty and universal truth,and his faith in the centrality of the individual has given his art a timelessness that makes his comments as sharply and irrefutably real today as they were when he first etched them in copper. Our edition has a remarkable history.Printed from the original plates during the Spanish Civil War in an edition of 125 sets,in order to raise funds for the Republican government,it was sent to London.There 100 sets were destroyed during bombing attack.Our copy had been left behind in Spain and survived.

Sad Forebding of What Will Happen is the first etching in Goya’s great cycle.In his etching Goya intent to show not only the horror of war he had witness first hand,but to point to the consequences.The people who kill or are killed in Disaster of War are individuals capable of suffering and of inflicting suffering.Goya consluded the Disasters with two etchings: Truth Is Dead,and Will She Rise Again?It is in the very last etching that he reaffirms his belief in human reason,in the hope that men and women,can rise above their passion,greed and brutality.It is because we share Goya’s faith that we are showing his work together with children’s art from around the world.Already his great circle of aquatints ,the Capricios(1799) Goya had commented repeatedly on Education and would have been delighted to see his work in company of children’s art.The art we are showing is special.It came from the children from Macedonia ,a country deeply divided by bitter and bloody conflict,children from the Jewish War Veteran Association of St Petersburg,from Turkey, and children from Poland who had visited Lublin Jewish cemetery and were searching to make sense .we would also like to have the artwork of children from Nanjing, a city that survived the Nanjing Massacre during the Japanese invasion of China ,one of the most abhorring war disasters in recent human history.Although happened more than fifty years ago ,war stories are still being told from older to the younger generations in thousand of families , nightmares still occurring in children’s dreams .In this very city ,the scar probably will never completely disapper , and the search for reason,like for the rest of the world ,will become forever. 


EPILOGUE
By /YU CHUN

The Exihibion of Goya and Children’s Art started from a small incident .A few year ago, I met Dr.Guggenheim in an art exhibition in Boston by visiting Chinese artists . Dr.Guggenheim is an anthropolpgist and artist.He taught at both MIT and Harvard and was establishing art schools for children in war-troubled areas around the world .I was finishing my postdoctoral fellowship in biomedical engineering at MIT and had just started writing poetry in English.Due to an instantaneous understanding of each other’s purpose in life we became great friends .Later ,during my visit to China, I mentioned the collections of Goya and children’s art on war by Dr.Guggenheim to artists in Nanjing.The constant efforts from both sides during the two years after made this exhibition in Nanjing Museum possible.

In art ,visual or poetry ,we record tragedies of the past to prevent the same tragedies from being reoeated in the future. In Nanjing, a city that experienced the horror of Nanjing Massacre , to forget the past would be a waste of the lives the eatlier generations had paid : to linger in the past and hatred would be an indifference to our own life and future . Perhaps our only way out is to search for truth and reason in our memories of the past and contemplation of the future . And the progress of mankind will be a forever effort to flight for and prolong peace between violence.


PREFACE
By/Tong Zhu

This exhibition was made possible by American anthropologist Hans Guggenheim’s rare collection of eighty-one Goya etchings depicting the devastation of the Spanish Civil War. 

Goya was an influential Spanish Master who lived during the 18th and 19th centuries. The breadth of his work and range in his style subsequently influenced romanticist, realist, impressionist, symbolist and expressionist art movements. In fact, many contemporary artists are still influenced by his work today. Goya was an accomplished artist in nearly all the artistic mediums of his time: oil painting, fresco, illustration, lithographs and etchings. His works present an array of arresting imagery and were created with expressive artistic language. Before Goya, art never so strongly reflected the vital relationship between contemporary political life, society and all kinds of world events. As well, before Goya, art never so intensely and deeply represented the inner heart of mankind and chaos. His work contains the seeds of possibility for the diversity that was about to appear in the art world. Goya’s search for freedom and rationality makes his art timeless and just as relevant as the first time he carefully and irrefutably etched into the copperplate.

The exhibition combines the works by Goya with children’s paintings from other regions of the world that have also experienced the traumas of war. Many of the works come from Nanjing, China; a city which suffered great devastation during the Second World War. The exhibition displays the great Master’s work and children’s paintings side-by-side to demonstrate that in both the past and present, we contemplate the consequences of such devastation. This idea radiates from the children’s paintings, which yearn for and anticipate world peace and a wonderful life. Even in today’s highly developed global economy and advanced society, humanity still confronts war, such as the war in Iraq, the Palestinian Israeli conflict and the 9 -11 attacks. The sorrow that this has brought to mankind is worthy of our consideration and a “call for peace” represents the wishes of all of mankind. Therefore in the present day these works remain extremely significant.

I express my deepest appreciation to the Nanjing Museum for being responsible for the timely organization of this exhibition and to Hans Guggenheim, who generously lent his rare works. I also express my deepest gratitude to all the individuals who offered help in the organization of this exhibition and especially to the children who created such beautiful artwork. 




Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Exhibition Post One- Galleri Abbekås, Sweden, 2007

exhibition in Galleri Abbekås, Sweden, 2007

Exhibition in Sweden - Galleri Abbekås


(  Guggenheim på Galleri Abbekås -  2007 )

Publicerad 13 juli 2007 16.22 Uppdaterad 17 juli 2010 1.51
Större eller mindre text


Från Guatemala och Kina till Abbekås. Motiven skiftar på Hans Guggenheims teckningar. I dag är det vernissage på en utställning på Galleri Abbekås där han visar över 50 av sina verk.

Han föddes för över 80 år sedan i Berlin. Under andra världskriget flydde familjen till Guatemala.

På 50-talet arbetade han för Life Magazine. Hans Guggenheim åkte då jorden runt och tecknade. Intresset för människor och miljöer gjorde att han sedan blev professor i antropologi, läran om människor.

Hans Guggenheim är fortfarande mycket produktiv. En del av de verk som visas i Abbekås har han gjort under en resa i fjor i Kina.

– Vi åkte båt på floden Li och under tiden satt jag och tecknade.

Han har under lång tid även varit influerad av kinesisk filosofi.

Hans Guggenheim säger att han föredrar att arbeta i svart och vitt eftersom det är en större utmaning.

– Vem som helst kan måla med färg. Men använder man bara svart och vitt måste man koncentrera sig mycket mer på formen.

I stort sett den enda teckningen som där är lite färg i är gjord under tiden i Abbekås och föreställer ett träd en bit bort från galleriet.

Under de senaste tio åren har han hunnit med att starta två konstskolor för ungdomar. En i Guatemala och en i Tibet.

Utställningen varar till den 29 juli och nytt är att den som vill köpa en tavla kan få den med sig direkt.

Monday, November 5, 2012

Exhibition in Australia - George Paton Gallery

( The University of Melbourne - Australia, 2008 )



Hans Guggenheim: Recent Drawings

The George Paton Gallery and the UNESCO Observatory are proud to present:
Exhibition will be launched by The Chancellor of The University of Melbourne, 
Mr. Ian Renard, at 6pm  
Opening Night: Tuesday 3 June, 5 / 8pm

This collection of drawings presents a diagrammatic travelogue, ornamented with cultural artifacts, ceremonies, and conversations that cross continents and time, as reminiscences and future recollections. Highly personalized renderings of cities, relics and memorials are presented through familiar and encrypted hieroglyphs.

Hans Guggenheim (b. Germany 1924, resides in New York), is an anthropologist, arts educator and humanist. He was the Associate Professor of Anthropology at MIT and visiting scholar at The Center for International Affairs at Harvard, where he worked on an evaluation of the contributions of UNESCO to the art and culture of traditional societies. He is the founder of Project Guggenheim, an international organization that establishes art school and programs in remote areas, promoting the continuation of traditional artistic practice as well as introducing modern technologies.

This exhibition is proudly sponsored by the UNESCO Observatory and the Faculty of Architecture Building and Planning at The University of Melbourne


Friday, November 2, 2012

Exhibition at Boston South End - Willey

Guggenheim’s sketches from Vietnam shine at the Willey

( Boston, 2008)


by Bessie King
MySouthEnd.com Contributor
Wednesday Dec 17, 2008


Wearing a light blue suit and a gold tie with panda bears printed on it, 84-year-old Hans Guggenheim chatted to visitors as they admired his drawings at the Michelle Willey Boutique on Dec. 11. Guggenheim was showcasing etchings from his latest trip to Vietnam, images that showed everything from the food he ate to the places he saw and the psychedelic images his imagination made him draw. 


With delicacy and simplicity the drawings expose detail and passion. It is easy to stare at one drawing, analyze individual pieces, and then assemble them together and enjoy the complete look. Whether it is of an angel with lobster wings, a scene from a forest, or Guggenheim’s head in wheels-a self-description of the artist cruising through Vietnam’s airport in a wheelchair. 

For those present, speaking to the artist only heightened the experience. Guggenheim, a noted artist, scholar, philanthropist, and world-traveler who taught Anthropology at MIT and Harvard, spoke about his pieces but also about his passion for art, philanthropy, and living life.

"I enjoy doing what I do, I feel that in art you can truly say what you can’t express with words and everyone can understand art even if they do not speak the same language," he said. "I think I am very lucky to be able to have art in my life and make a difference with it."

His trip to Vietnam was a mission for his arts charity, Project Guggenheim, an international non-profit funded in1997 that provides training in traditional arts and contemporary skills for young artists and artisans in remote areas of the world. Through it he establishes schools, donates art, and tries to make a difference in countries that lack exposure to art or funding.

He helped Vietnam, a country torn by political unrest, by donating over 30 original Francisco de Goya sketches dealing with the subject of war. Not only poignant, his donation is also impressive. Goya’s drawings are rare, specifically those dealing with the time period in which the Spanish artist commemorated Spain’s resistance to Napoleon’s armies during the occupation of 1808. Guggenheim made the donation form his personal collection.