American, born 1985

Battery Park City Esplanade, 21st century, 2017 (printed 2024)

Inkjet print mounted to dibond

The Mr. and Mrs. Bernard M. Granum Fund

Ethan Aaro Jones invites viewers to consider the world around us, and moments that may be easily missed. Taken along the banks of the Hudson River, Jones photographs the natural border between the states of New York and New Jersey, as well as the human-made additions to the environment. Here, the ladder, hoses, and diving helmet imply the interruption or a pause in a moment of exploration, akin to the search for the Northwest Passage that inspired the artist’s series “An Unsearchable Distance,” of which this work is a part of.

 

Hispano-Moresque Charger with the Morelli arms, 15th century, c. 1430-70

Tin-glazed earthenware

The Walter C. and Mary C. Briggs Trust Fund

Spanish ceramic production was the most sophisticated in Europe in the 15th century. This lusterware dish was produced by Islamic potters in Manises, Valencia–an important center of production for the luxury wares. It was commissioned by the distinguished Morelli family of Florence and exported to Renaissance Italy, The Morelli arms appear at the center of the dish, surrounded by a fusion of Islamic and Gothic decorative motifs rendered in glazes of shimmering copper and cobalt blue.

Japanese, 1683 – 1751

Hammered iron full-face armor mask, 18th century, 1737

Made in two connected sections; iron and the interior in red lacquer

The Mary Griggs Burke Endowment Fund established by the Mary Livingston Griggs and Mary Griggs Burke Foundation

The majority of armor masks were only half length, leaving the eyes and forehead uncovered. This is a full-face mask constructed in two segments by Myōchin Muneakira, who is considered one of the greatest armor makers in Japan’s history. Including this one there are only four masks known that he inscribed with a date. He created this one in 1737 when he was 54 years old and, in his peak, attested by the exceptional level of smoothness and elegance and the perfectly curved lines and balanced forms.

Chain mail coat and gloves, 19th century

Iron, cloth, leather

The Gary L. Gliem Endowment for Japanese Art

Not all samurai during the Edo period (1603–1868) wore suits of armor. Some, like rōnin who were not in the employment of a lord or samurai police officials in the large cities like Edo, today’s Tokyo, wore chain mail (kusari) for protection. This is a matching set of chain mail jacket (kusari katabira) and gloves (kusari han kote). The linked chain is attached on layers of indigo dyed cloth, decorated with family crests in gold. The collar was once furnished with hexagon shaped iron plates (kikkō) that are now lost.

American (1850-1932)

Lone Felucca at Dusk near Roda along the Nile, 19th century, c. 1876

Oil on canvas

Gift of funds from Siri and Bob Marshall

Not all samurai during the Edo period (1603–1868) wore suits of armor. Some, like rōnin who were not in the employment of a lord or samurai police officials in the large cities like Edo, today’s Tokyo, wore chain mail (kusari) for protection. This is a matching set of chain mail jacket (kusari katabira) and gloves (kusari han kote). The linked chain is attached on layers of indigo dyed cloth, decorated with family crests in gold. The collar was once furnished with hexagon shaped iron plates (kikkō) that are now lost.

Votive Stupa, 9th-10th century, c. 9th century

Bronze with copper and silver alloy

The Kenneth and Elayne Hengler Endowment for Art Acquisition, the William Hood Dunwoody Fund, and anonymous gift

Votive Stupa, 15th-16th century, c. 15th-16th century
Copper alloy

The Kenneth and Elayne Hengler Endowment for Art Acquisition, the William Hood Dunwoody Fund, and anonymous gift

Here, we see two types of votive stupas, bronzes respectively from India and Nepal, from the 9th-16th centuries. The structure of these works derive from the hemispherical burial mounds initially erected over the relics of the Buddha in India, and now sprinkle the landscape of the Himalayas as representations of the Buddha, his teachings, and a microcosm of the universe. The scale of the works indicate they were portable, commissioned for donation, worship, and meditative aid on one’s journey to accrue merit and achieve liberation. Austere yet crisp, the Indian example features a square base, inset with a niche with a Buddha image, with the bell-like domes (further representing the Buddha body) terminating in a conical mast with parasols, representing protection and the stages of enlightenment. It was cast with a hollow interior to contain sacred materials such as texts, here still inside yet hidden from view. Such works were frequently taken by pilgrims to Nepal, where the structure would be infused with a more elaborate aesthetic sensibilities, including a four-stepped “Lion Throne” base ( alluding to the four stages of consciousness) would literally feature rampant lions, and the overall effect–with the four Buddhas preceding over cardinal directions–appearing as if in a palace.

Botswanan (active Canada), born 1980

Front Room, 2022

Oil and pencil on linen

Gift of funds from Mary and Bob Mersky

This mixed-media painting features Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum’s alter-ego Asme (“as me”) seated in a domestic interior accompanied by three other women. Two of the women hold Asme’s hands, offering comfort and assurance. Sunstrum’s composition references French painter Auguste Toulmouche’s The Hesitant Fiancée (1866), but whereas his bride-to-be reveals momentary doubt, Asme expresses barely restrained rage, a defiant reaction to her realization of powerlessness over social and cultural expectations that frequently regulate women’s roles, behavior, or appearance.

 

Russian, 1866–1944

Rapallo-Bagni Louisa, 1906

Oil on cardboard

Gift of Harriet and Walter Pratt

In 1906, Vassily Kandinsky and his lover, the painter Gabrielle Münter, spent some months along the Italian Riviera making sketches, paintings, and photographs of the surrounding landscape. In this painting, Kandinsky captures the coastal town of Rapallo-Bagni, laying down color with a palette knife in quick, expressionistic strokes. This painting is one part of a remarkable gift made by Harriet and Walter Pratt, featuring European and American artists shaking up conventional notions of art in the early 1900s.

 

American (Luiseño), 1937–2005

Unfinished Dancer, 1979

Oil on canvas

Gift of the Herfurth family

Fritz Scholder is one of the most influential Native American painters of the twentieth century. Raised in Minnesota, Scholder spent most of his life in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he painted and taught at the Institute of American Indian Arts. This monumental painting, nearly seven-by-six feet, exhibits his signature style of an individual figure within an abstracted space.

 

Indian, active c. 1780–1820s

Arjuna Confronted by a Wild Boar, Illustration from a Kirata Arjuniya series, Kangra, c. 1820

Opaque watercolor heightened with gold on paper

The John R. Van Derlip Trust Fund and Gift of funds from Linda and Ken Cutler

This scene is inspired by the epic Mahabharata, illustrating a moment in which a demigod competes with a deity and, by demonstrating valor and humility, receives a great boon. Seeking powerful weapons from the gods, the hero warrior Arjuna, lower right, is shown engaging in prayer and ritual to please them. The demon Mukasara, disguised as a wild boar, erupts from the landscape to distract Arjuna from his activity. Arjuna shoots the boar, but so does Lord Shiva, who appears as a hunter with a retinue of celestial beings. An argument ensues over who shot the boar first, leading to battle. Arjuna cedes to Shiva, who repays him with an all-powerful weapon.

 

American, 1903–1986

Visionary, c. 1980

Nickel-silver on Montel metal

Gift of Alan and Michael Lipton

Seymour Lipton is among the most renowned sculptors of his generation. An innovator of form and process, he created abstracted works that always had a reference point in storytelling or the natural world. His titles often provide clues. “Visionary” suggests someone who can see or imagine a future. The dome-like structure to the top of the sculpture implies a skull or head, and the pipe-like form suggests a telescope or an eye. A provocative example of his late work, Visionary shows all of Lipton’s talents coming together. It has scale, power, and formal imagination, and it suggests the image of a guardian, oracle, or watcher.

 

French, 1852–1926

Washerwomen’s Lunch, 1900

Oil on canvas

Gift of Alfred and Ingrid Lenz Harrison

In the 1880s, Jean-Eugène Buland decided to forgo the classical and historical subjects of his training, turning instead to scenes of everyday life in the French countryside. But rather than depicting his subjects engaged in labor, he often focused on quiet moments of rest, like this painting of washerwomen breaking for lunch in the afternoon sun. Buland often used the new medium of photography to create his hyper-realistic paintings. He executed the sunlit scene with loose brushstrokes, yet the surfaces of the forms—textiles, hair, flesh, wood, glass, dirt—are rendered with startling intensity.

 

Chinese, 1555–1636

Two poems in running script, 1622

Hanging scroll, ink on paper

Gift of Mark Pratt

In written Chinese, each word is represented by its own unique symbol, presenting rich opportunities to combine visual aesthetics with linguistic meaning. In fact, calligraphy, literally “beautiful writing,” was the visual art form prized above all others in traditional China. Dong Qichang, who brushed these characters, was among the finest artists of the late Ming period and a great theorist whose ideas influenced Chinese aesthetic thought for centuries. Dong’s works are part of a large collection assembled over a lifetime by Mark S. Pratt, and recently given to Mia. As a U.S. diplomat to Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the Republic of China, Pratt encountered many living painters and calligraphers who helped him acquire works by historical masters.