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Engineered for Domestic Bliss

<div class="gmail_default">In East Asia, calligraphy has been hailed as the highest of all art forms for more than 15 centuries. It’s not hard to understand why: With more than 80,000 Chinese characters and infinite graphic variations, the expressive potential is unlimited. The results, as seen in this exhibition, speak for themselves. Each work is a unique expression of the artist’s personality, offering a glimpse into the culture that held calligraphy in such high esteem.</div>
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<div class="gmail_default" style="margin-bottom: 30px">The Japanese writing system was adopted from Chinese characters; given the Japanese reverence for Chinese artistic traditions, these works explore the full range of scripts possible with these characters: seal script (tensho), running script (gyosho), cursive script (sosho), clerical script (reisho), and standard script (kaisho). Calligraphy’s emphasis on movement and timing suggests dancing, and each script has its own rhythm, from the formal strictness of seal script to the wild dance of cursive writing.</div>
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This exhibition will be presented in three rotations: 
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<li>Rotation 1: August 1, 2020 &#8211; June 6, 2021.</li>
<li> Rotation 2: June 19, 2021 &#8211; April 10, 2022.</li>
<li> Rotation 3: April 23, 2022 &#8211; April 19, 2023.</li>
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<div style="margin-top: 40px"><a class="link-fade-in-brdr" href="https://lume.space/mia/group/20-dances-japanese-calligraphy-then-and-now"><button class="background-black">Explore the art in this exhibition from home.</button></a></div>
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<div id="attachment_84774" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84774" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84774 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20092611/mia_6017324_Crop-e1595273207135.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="479" />Maki Ryōkō, 1787–1833, Lu Tong&#8217;s Tea Song, 19th century (detail), hanging scroll; ink on silk, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.19</div>
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Clerical Script 
隸書 (Jp.: reisho; Ch.: lishu) 
Clerical script was the starting point for stylized calligraphy: curved lines were straightened, radicals (graphic components that indicate the meaning of the character) were simplified and merged, the number of strokes were reduced. The script developed in China around 300 BCE and became increasingly important during the Han Dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE) as the territory expanded and an increasing number of imperial edicts needed to be copied and distributed across the country. This job fell to the official clerics, and was made possible with the advent of paper and silk as substrates, rather than stone or bamboo strips. 
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<div id="attachment_84775" style="width: 426px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84775" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84775 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20092832/mia_6017309_Cropped-e1595273349404.jpg" alt="" width="416" height="500" />Nakai Tōjū, 1608–48, Bring the Qin, 17th century (detail), hanging scroll; ink on paper, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.24</div>
Seal Script 
篆書 (Jp: tensho; Ch: zhuanshu) 
Seal script reflects the earliest form of Chinese calligraphy. It developed during the Zhou Dynasty (c. 1045–256 BCE) and was standardized around 300 to 200 BCE. Ultimately the script fell out of favor due to its linearity, which did not lend itself to the fluid strokes of the calligrapher’s brush. It did, however, continue to be used for seal carvings, which were generally made of stone and were used to apply an individual’s official signature or identifying mark to a document or other object. 
The script underwent a revival from around 1600 to 1900 CE, and was used as visual shorthand for archaism, a reference to the ancient world. It was especially favored by scholars interested in Chinese antiquity. 
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<div id="attachment_84776" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84776" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84776 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20093050/mia_8010159_Detail-e1595273480871.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="428" />Suda Kokuta, 1906–90, Words Concerned with Existence, 1984 (detail), ink on paper, Gift of the Clark Center for Japanese Art &amp; Culture, 2013.29.1337.1-2, © Suda Kokuta</div>
Standard Script 
楷書 (Jp: kaisho; Ch: kaishu) 
The next step in calligraphy’s innovation was the development of a standard script. Standard or regular script is used when clarity is of the utmost importance, such as for formal documents, books, etc. It was also the script most commonly used for mass printing, which was first invented in China around 800 CE, while movable type developed around 1000 to 1100 CE. 
Though standard script’s crisp lines would seemingly require less skill, such regularity requires a steady hand and an understanding of how much ink to load onto the brush to achieve a consistent stroke—any error or irregularity would be glaringly obvious. 
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<div id="attachment_84777" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84777" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84777 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20093208/mia_6017316_Cropped_Detail-e1595273559782.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="347" />Ōtagaki Rengetsu, 1791–1875, Letter to Tomioka Tessai, 19th century (detail), Ink on paper, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.6</div>
Cursive Script 
草書 (Jp: sōsho; Ch: caoshu) 
Similar to Western shorthand, cursive script may have appeared as early as 200 BCE out of a need for a rapid, simplified way of writing clerical script. Cursive script was used chiefly for private and informal communications as well as for poetry. 
The shapes of the characters are greatly abbreviated and sometimes altered to such an extent that they do not resemble the standard forms. Brush strokes are wave-shaped and made rapidly. The difficulty of reading this fluid script is further increased because several characters are often vertically connected without interruption. 
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<div id="attachment_84778" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-84778" loading="lazy" class="wp-image-84778 size-full" src="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/20093330/mia_6017329_Cropped-e1595273637706.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="396" />Ema Saikō, 1787–1861, On Becoming Fifty, 1836 (detail), hanging scroll; ink on paper, Gift of Stephen Addiss and Audrey Yoshiko Seo, 2013.63.37</div>
Running Script 
行書 (Jp: gyōsho; Ch: xingshu) 
Running or semi-cursive script is an intermediate form between standard script and cursive script. As it is not as abbreviated as cursive script it can be read by most people who can read standard script. 
Developed before 100 CE, it became the usual style of handwriting. 
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20 Dances: Japanese Calligraphy Then and Now

Museums strip objects of their original context. Then the objects are reinterpreted and placed among works they might never have encountered otherwise. Playing with the notions of decontextualization and recontextualization that occur at Mia, &#8220;POSTURING&#8221; conceptually approaches futility and paradox as it relates to abstract presentations of content through a sculptural installation featuring multiple videos.
Joshua McGarvey lives and works in Minneapolis. He received his MFA from the University of Minnesota, and an MA and BFA from Ball State University. He has received a number of awards and grants including the 2018 Jerome Emerging Artist Fellowship, 2017 and 2020 Artist Initiative Grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board, and a 2015-2016 Art(ist) on the Verge Emerging Artist Fellowship.
This exhibition is part of the <a href="http://new.artsmia.org/exhibitions/maep/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Minnesota Artists Exhibition Program</a>, now located in the U.S. Bank Gallery.
Generous support for MAEP provided by: 
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone wp-image-69432 " src="https://live-artsmia.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/McKnight_logo_whtonblk_rgb-1.png" alt="" width="300" height="54" srcset="https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/01101456/McKnight_logo_whtonblk_rgb-1.png 800w, https://images.artsmia.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/01101456/McKnight_logo_whtonblk_rgb-1.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Additional support provided by RBC Wealth Management.

Joshua McGarvey: POSTURING

Woven textiles are inherently geometric. Vertical warp and horizontal weft threads impose a gridded framework that is necessarily linear and two-dimensional. It guides but it also constrains. Presented here is a group of newly acquired textile works, all on view for the first time, which bear witness to artistic experiments in color and form that both celebrate and defy this intrinsic geometry.

2020.75

Parallel Lines: New Textile Masterworks Inspired by Geometry

Western viewers are often curious about why Chinese artists write on their paintings and what the characters say. This exhibition answers such questions and explores the idea of integrating fine painting, poetry, and calligraphy, known as the “Three Perfections,” in a single artwork. 
In traditional China, painting was regarded as “silent poetry,” and poetry as “painting with sound.” Both could only be manifested through the “art of handwriting”—calligraphy. Scholars and scholar-artists used calligraphic brushstrokes in their paintings and considered their artworks to be vehicles of self-expression. As a result, painting was not only considered the only art pure and lyrical enough to stand on an equal footing with poetry and contemplative thought, but also something through which one could experience sight, sound, smell, touch, and emotions.

The Three Perfections: Image, Poem, and Calligraphy in Chinese Painting

By the 1700s, the once mighty seafaring republic of Venice had been in decline for 300 years. Yet the island city still had one undiminished power—magic. Grand palaces, churches, flotillas of elegant gondolas floated above luminous reflections. Intricate systems of canals and walkways offered endless unexpected perspectives. Centuries of exquisite art could be found everywhere.
With much support from tourists who flocked to see the city’s wonders, Venice’s artistic tradition continued to flourish. Three great artists and their families dominated: Antonio Canale (known as Canaletto), Giambattista Tiepolo, and Francesco Guardi. Mia has long had fine prints and drawings by the first two. This presentation celebrates the recent addition of Mia&#8217;s first outstanding Guardi drawing.

2021.25

Venice in the 1700s

Writing, geometric forms, and textures collide in the works of Maki Haku (1924-2000). Although he never received formal training, Maki learned about printmaking by associating with artists of sōsaku hanga (creative print movement), who valued the artist’s hand in the creation of prints. Maki made his own printing blocks by carving a motif onto a piece of plywood, filling the carved-out areas with cement paste, and passing the print several times through a press to achieve various textures. Calligraphy is central to his works; he sometimes manipulates calligraphy to defy reading, thereby drawing attention to the form of Chinese characters. This exhibition features prints given to Mia from the extensive collection of Sue Y.S. Kimm and Seymour Grufferman.

2019.78.216

The Poetic Abstractions of Maki Haku: Prints from the Kimm-Grufferman Collection

Marcia Resnick (Brooklyn, born 1950) was one of the most ambitious and innovative American photographers of the 1970s. Combining social critique with poignant, often humorous performance, her photographs explore—in a conceptual vernacular—aesthetic, social, and political issues at once timely and timeless. A part of the now-mythic creative community in downtown New York, she created work that challenged traditional ideas about what a photograph could be. This exhibition brings together for the first time her extraordinary photographs from this period.
This exhibition was organized by the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, and the George Eastman Museum.
Learn more from <a href="https://new.artsmia.org/stories/how-marcia-resnick-captured-the-spirit-of-downtown-new-york-and-lived-to-tell">the introduction</a> to the exhibition catalogue, Marcia Resnick: As It Is or Could Be, reproduced by permission of <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/">Yale University Press</a>. The catalogue is available from <a href="https://shop.artsmia.org/products/marcia-resnick-as-it-is-or-could-be">The Store at Mia</a>.

Stories

2019.99.5

Marcia Resnick: As It Is or Could Be

In the mid-1800s, many French and Belgian artists rejected grandiose images of mythology and history to focus on everyday lives, especially those of rural folk, laborers, and the disaffected—people most vulnerable to the whims of the powerful. These artists called themselves Realists. Their social concerns, artistic talent, and frequently journalistic approach resonated with University of Minnesota Professor Gabriel P. Weisberg and his wife, Yvonne. Fifty years ago, they engaged in deep, original research into the Realists, often rediscovering significant but neglected artists. They began to collect drawings and small paintings by these Realists, later adding examples of Symbolism and Art Nouveau. The result is a fascinating, irreplaceable collection that the Weisbergs have designated as a promised gift to Mia. Come celebrate their generosity and explore these intimate works of art.
This exhibition will be presented in two rotations:
Rotation 1, Works 1830–1900: May 14, 2022 – February 19, 2023
Rotation 2, Works 1900–1930: March 4 &#8211; December 10, 2023

L2007.89.30

Reflections on Reality: Drawings and Paintings from the Weisberg Collection

In this striking series of images, visual artist Yee I-Lann creates graphically distinctive photographic assemblages to address the legacies of Dutch colonialism in Indonesia and elsewhere in Southeast Asia. By appropriating historical photographs sourced from colonial archives in the Netherlands, and arranging them with her own photography, the artist provides new grounds for interpreting the visual record of imperialism in Southeast Asia. The resulting images are purposefully surreal: by removing most of the background context for the figures in these images, the artist underscores the selective nature of any historical account. As the Malaysian daughter of a New Zealand–born mother and Sino-Kadazan father, Yee I-Lann draws on her own transnational and transcultural heritage to present a counternarrative to the Dutch historical record.

2015.87.1

Yee I-Lann: Picturing Power

Triển lãm miễn phí
Teo Nguyen’s solo museum exhibition invites contemplation and reflection on the Vietnamese people’s struggles toward peace and what the artist calls “the politics of worthiness.” Nguyen tells stories of heartbreak, optimism, resistance, and reconciliation that are interwoven into Vietnamese culture and spiritualism. His photorealist paintings reference historic images by photojournalists documenting the war in Vietnam, but reimagine them without violence. By eliminating the helicopters, weapons, fighting, victims, and fallen soldiers, he reveals a country of diverse natural beauty. This act of reclamation shines a light on a Vietnam beyond the war, a place of rich culture and picturesque topography. My Being, a short film inspired by his mother’s poems of loss and separation, and a photo-based installation in the show present narratives from a Vietnamese perspective. Born and raised in Vietnam, Nguyen lives and works in Minneapolis.
Triển lãm bảo tàng cá nhân của Teo Nguyen gợi lên sự chiêm nghiệm và suy ngẫm về cuộc đấu tranh vì hòa bình của dân tộc Việt Nam và điều mà người nghệ sĩ này gọi là “niềm tin vào sự xứng đáng”. Nguyen kể những câu chuyện về nỗi đau, tinh thần lạc quan, ý chí phản kháng và thiện chí hoà giải đan xen vào văn hoá và tinh thần của người Việt Nam. Các bức tranh theo trường phái hiện thực của ông đề cập đến những hình ảnh lịch sử mà các phóng viên ảnh ghi lại cuộc chiến ở Việt Nam, nhưng tái hiện chúng mà không có bóng dáng của bạo lực. Bằng cách loại bỏ đi các yếu tố như máy bay trực thăng, vũ khí, cuộc giao tranh, nạn nhân và những người lính đã ngã xuống, ông đã giới thiệu về một đất nước mang vẻ đẹp tự nhiên phong phú. Sự điều chỉnh này đã vẽ ra bối cảnh tươi sáng về một Việt Nam tự do, nơi có nền văn hóa phong phú và phong cảnh đẹp như tranh. My Being, bộ phim ngắn lấy cảm hứng từ những bài thơ về sự mất mát và chia ly của mẹ ông, đồng thời là tác phẩm sắp đặt theo ảnh trong buổi triển lãm sẽ chia sẻ những câu chuyện từ góc nhìn của người Việt Nam. Sinh ra và lớn lên tại Việt Nam, Nguyen hiện sinh sống và làm việc ở Minneapolis.

Related Events

Teo Nguyen: Việt Nam Peace Project Teo Nguyễn: Giấc Mơ Hòa Bình

The works of art featured in this exhibition are recent additions to Mia’s permanent collection. Though just a small sample of the many works acquired through purchase, gift, or bequest in recent years, they reflect Mia’s ongoing initiatives to expand and broaden its collection of postwar (1945–80) and contemporary drawings, watercolors, and collages, and to better represent the remarkable diversity of artistic achievement in the United States and elsewhere. To this end, Mia is acquiring important works on paper by leading artists whose work is either absent or underrepresented in the museum’s collection, especially those whose work has faced discrimination within the traditional Eurocentric view of art history. Resetting our collecting strategy is one way Mia can stay true to its mission of enriching the community by collecting, preserving, and exhibiting outstanding works of art.

2021.23

Recent Acquisitions: Postwar + Contemporary Works on Paper

The Staff Art Show spotlights artworks by Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia)team members from a range of departments across the museum. The Staff Art Show was organized and curated by Team Mia.
Team Mia members work collaboratively to cultivate a positive work environment, encourage generosity and relationship- building among staff, provide accessible opportunities for connection and growth, and recognize and celebrate museum employees. Team Mia is pleased to showcase the immense talent among us.

Mia Staff Art Show

Mia’s remarkable collection of 18th-century French periodicals—on view for the first time—document the tumultuous years leading up to and spanning the French Revolution. Regarded as the first modern fashion magazines, they were issued at an unprecedented pace—eventually every 10 days—to keep up with fashions that seemed to change daily. “Revolution à la Mode” showcases their charming hand-colored fashion plates, and demonstrates how fashion, theater, and politics influenced one another as France constructed a new democracy.
From 1790 to 1792, these magazines included musical scores from contemporary theater productions for amateur performances at home. Mia partnered with violinist Peter Sheppard Skaerved (London’s Royal Academy of Music) and musicologist Rebecca Geoffroy-Schwinden (University of North Texas) to make new recordings of these songs long lost to history, allowing visitors to experience the soundscape of Revolutionary Paris.

Related Blogs

P.15,303-P.15,305

Revolution à la Mode: Fashion and Music in Revolutionary France

This exhibition presents 15 works made by artists in present-day Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia during Spanish colonial rule. One of the largest and longest-lasting European empires, the Spanish realms spanned from South Asia to South America and lasted nearly 500 years. Spanish South American art was a dynamic, unique combination of styles and influences, as European prototypes were translated and adapted by local hands. The paintings and sculptures on view adorned churches and convents across Spanish America, though most of the paintings hung in private homes for personal contemplation and prayer. The works belong to the Carl &amp; Marilynn Thoma Collection, which is committed to promoting the art of the Spanish Americas through scholarship and exhibition of its extensive collection from South America and the Caribbean.
Organized by the Carl and Marilynn Thoma Foundation.

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Ongoing Exhibitions

Engineered for Domestic Bliss

20 Dances: Japanese Calligraphy Then and Now

Joshua McGarvey: POSTURING