AGNES MARTIN EXHIBITION OPENS IN EDINBURGH
ARTIST ROOMS SCOTTISH NATIONAL GALLERY OF MODERN ART,
75 Belford Road, Edinburgh, EH4 3DR 6 August - 8 November 2009
Admission Free General Enquiries: 0131 624 6200
A rare display of one of America's foremost abstract painters will
be unveiled this summer as part of the programme of ARTIST ROOMS
exhibitions at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. The
presentation of late works by Agnes Martin (1912-2004) will
include three paintings held in ARTIST ROOMS, complemented by a group
of works on loan courtesy of the artist's estate, PaceWildenstein, New
York and Arne and Milly Glimcher.
Martin is acclaimed for her singular, abstract practice that
spanned a career of nearly five decades. Born in Canada, Martin was
descended from Scottish pioneers who moved from the Isle of Skye to
Canada in the late 19th century. She moved to New York
in 1957 where she became influenced by the work of the American
Abstract Expressionist artists. Her development of a pure, abstract
style led her work to be aligned with Minimalism. However, Martin
refuted this, maintaining that her concern was with the inner,
emotional world. For most of her career, Martin worked in isolation,
inspired by her reading of ancient Chinese Tao philosophy and by the
bare desert landscapes in New Mexico where she resided from 1967 until
her death in 2004.
Dating from between 1994 and 2003, the eight paintings presented
at the Gallery of Modern Art, highlight the scope of Martin's late
practice, particularly her tactile handling of paint and use of a
broader range of hues in her palette. In contrast to the
large grid-based works the artist made in the 1960s, these paintings
are primarily composed of horizontal bands of ethereal colour, and all
are painted on a uniform size of canvas, reduced in scale. These works
move between a preoccupation with ordered geometry
and the irregularity created by hand-drawn pencil lines. She viewed
this deliberate inconsistency which undermines the possibility of
geometric perfection as analogous to the human condition. In the late
1990s after a long period of leaving her works untitled,
Martin reintroduced titles into her work to evoke states of euphoria
and memories of past happiness, such as the two paintings Happy Holiday (1999) and Faraway Love (1999) which will be on show at the Gallery of Modern Art this summer.
This exhibition forms part of the programme of ARTIST ROOMS, a new
collection of modern and contemporary art held by Tate and National
Galleries of Scotland for the nation. ARTIST ROOMS was established
through The d'Offay Donation in 2008, with the assistance
of the National Heritage Memorial Fund, The Art Fund and the Scottish
and British Governments. ARTIST ROOMS is being shared with museums and
galleries throughout the UK with the support of independent charity The
Art Fund, and within Scotland, the Scottish
Government.
Throughout 2009, National Galleries of Scotland and Tate and 13
museums and galleries across the UK will be showing over 30 ARTIST
ROOMS from the collection created by the dealer and collector, Anthony
d'Offay, and acquired by the nation in February 2008.
This is the first time a national collection has been shared and shown
simultaneously across the UK, and has only been made possible through
the exceptional generosity of independent charity The Art Fund and, in
Scotland, of The Scottish Government.
The collection of 725 works, representing one of the most
important holdings of post-war and contemporary international art in
private hands, was assembled by Anthony d'Offay, whose London galleries
played a key role in the promotion and understanding
of twentieth-century art in the UK over a period of more than 30 years.
www.nationalgalleries.org
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