DEGAS: AN ARTISTIC JOURNEY
Spring Course 2018
Delve into the world of Edgar Degas in this four-part course that will explore the influences, evolution, and independence of the iconic artist. Participants will learn about his complex approach to contemporary themes, his masterful experimentation across mediums and techniques, and the strong dualities of his personality and style of working.
$75 members/$85 nonmembers for full four-session course. Single session tickets will go on sale April 2, pending availability ($20 members/$23 nonmembers per single session).
SCHEDULE & LOCATION
- Saturdays, April 21 & May 12, 19, 2018
- 2:30–4 pm
- Denver Art Museum, Lower Level (Please note: The course is held in Sharp Auditorium. Tickets to the exhibition are sold separately.)
SESSION DESCRIPTIONS
APRIL 21 — Curator's Overview of Degas: A Passion for Perfection
With wit and charm, Dr. Standring’s lecture will address all of the behind-the-scenes activities that a curator performs whilst conceiving, planning and implementing Degas: A Passion for Perfection at the Denver Art Museum. You’ll learn much about the artist, as well as about the team of professionals at the museum who worked over the past five years to bring this exhibition to life. The key to success of its narrative stems from mutual respect, teamwork, diplomacy, and a great sense of humor. After all, our challenge was to present a story that accommodated the fiercely independent artist who defies categorization, Edgar Degas.
Presented by Timothy J. Standring, Gates Foundation Curator of Painting & Sculpture at the DAM.
MAY 12 — Degas' Many Women
Over the course of his artistic career Edgar Degas’ representations of female subjects were as numerous and varied as the media he used to make them. Whether he was painting heroines from Greek mythology, copying Renaissance biblical figures, or making pastels or prints of modern Parisiennes—hat-makers, bourgeoises, laundresses, artists, singers, bathers, or prostitutes—he found an endless source of inspiration in women. Delve into a deeper examination of these alternately empowering and deeply troubling images.
Presented by Giulia Bernardini, art historian.
MAY 19 — Degas & the Art Market: Collector, Collected
Discover another dimension of Degas with a peek into the world of dealers and collectors who helped promote and sell his work during his lifetime and who played a role in establishing his legacy after his death. Learn about Degas' own passion for collecting and how the thousands of paintings, drawings, and prints he acquired tell the story of his ongoing fascination with and the influences of fellow artists of the period and those who preceded him.
Presented by Molly Medakovich, art historian and DAM teaching specialist.
ABOUT THE PRESENTERS
Dr. Timothy J. Standring
Dr. Timothy J. Standring is the Gates Foundation Curator of Painting & Sculpture at the Denver Art Museum. In addition to his Wyeth: Andrew and Jamie in the Studio, that opened in Denver, November 2015, before it traveled to Madrid, he has curated ten other shows at the museum, including two important exhibitions, Becoming Van Gogh and Castiglione: Lost Genius. He has published many articles for a wide variety of journals on topics that have covered a broad range of subjects, including the art collecting habits of seventeenth-century Roman patrons, monographic studies on European artists, British watercolor sketching, Impressionist portraits, and reviews of exhibitions on many artists. His next exhibition will be focused on another Dutch artist known as Rembrandt van Rijn.
Lauren Thompson
Lauren Thompson is the interpretive specialist for western American, European, and American art at the DAM, where she has been the lead educator on Glory of Venice: Masterworks of the Renaissance, Degas: A Passion for Perfection, and Backstory: Western American Art in Context, among other exhibitions. Prior to coming to the DAM, she served as director of programs at the Ann Arbor Art Center, commissioner of the Ann Arbor Public Art Commission, and education specialist for the Alliance for the Arts in Research Universities at the University of Michigan.
Giulia Bernardini
Giulia Bernardini is an instructor of humanities at the University of Colorado. An Italian-American hybrid and trained actress, she enjoys experimenting with pedagogical techniques in both the classroom and the museum and is fascinated by the relationship between teaching and performance. She has had the pleasure of teaching several courses for the DAM and has also led various tours during DAM Untitled Final Fridays.
Dr. Molly Medakovich
Dr. Molly Medakovich has worked as an educator in the DAM’s learning and engagement department since 2012. Currently a teaching specialist for adult programs, her focus is on adult and college audiences and lifelong learning. You can find her in the galleries leading a monthly Mindful Looking session, lecturing on European and American art in exhibition-related courses, or working with docents on best practices of gallery teaching. She has a Ph.D. in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European art history and, in addition to her work at the DAM, teaches art history courses at the University of Denver and the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.
Adult programs are supported by William Randolph Hearst Endowment for Education Programs, Nancy Benson Education Endowment Fund, CenturyLink Endowment, Jim Kelley and Amie Knox Education Endowment Fund, Colorado Creative Industries, and the citizens who support the Scientific and Cultural Facilities District (SCFD).
Image: Edgar Degas, Four Ballet Dancers on Stage (Quatro Bailarinas em Cena), 1885/1890. Oil paint on canvas; 28-3/4 x 36-1/4 in. (73 x 92 cm). Gift, Walther Moreira Salles, Simone Pilon, Jacques Pilon, Benedito Manhães Barreto, um comissário de café em Santos [a coffee commissioner in Santos], Industriais da Juta de São Paulo e [and] Diários Associados de São Paulo, 1950. Inv. MASP.00082 Collection: Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand. Photo by João Musa.
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ExhibitionDegas
A Passion for PerfectionOn View through May 20, 2018This exhibition showcases prolific French artist Edgar Degas’ works from 1855 to 1906. More than 100 works consisting of paintings, drawings, pastels, etchings, monotypes, and sculptures in bronze are on view. The DAM is the sole American venue for the exhibition. More