Exhibition

The Collector’s Eye : Art, Antique Carpets, Decorative & Ethnographic Arts

Join us Saturday, February 23, 1pm-5pm For a Special Pre-Sale Exhibition & Reception With Live Middle Eastern Music & Refreshments On February 24, Material Culture will hold an important auction of fine art, antiques, carpets, and ethnographic arts under the title “Collector’s Eye.” A portion of the 300+ lots up for sale come from the art collection of the international healthcare company GlaxoSmithKline LLC, which holds many museum-quality pieces. The auction catalogue is available online through LiveAuctioneers, who will also facilitate live internet bidding at the time of the sale. The auction begins at 11 AM on Sunday, February 24, 2013. The auction preview will be open Thursday, February 21 and run through Saturday, February 23, 10am-5pm daily. Kitaro Shirayamandi One of the exceptional pieces brought to auction by GlaxoSmithKline is a Rookwood Vase from 1900, decorated by Kitaro Shirayamandi with gorgeous chrysanthemums for Rookwood Pottery. Maria Longworth founded the Rookwood Pottery Company in 1880 in Cincinnati, Ohio, inspired by Japanese ceramics and under-glaze French pottery. Rookwood was the first American company to gain international admiration for ceramics from the United States, surprising detractors of American craft by winning the First Prize Gold Medal at the Paris Exposition [...]

Obama Folk-Art Exhibit Featured in ICON Magazine

The article below is featured in the Philly arts magazine ICON this month (November). It was reprinted with permission from ICON Magazine. You can review the entire issue, and past issues, at iconmagazineonline.com West African sign painters portray America’s first African-American president as pitchman-wingman By Geoff Gehman In 2009 a West African artist with one name made Barack Obama his lobbyist. Sheff painted portraits of Obama to advertise his sign-painting store in Accra, Ghana. Then he placed the pictures outside his ramshackle shop, hoping that customers would be more inclined to employ a sign painter endorsed by likenesses of America’s first African-American president. Lehigh University Obama Folk Art Exhibit That July an American entrepreneur-ethnographer named George Jevremovic stopped by Sheff’s shop. He was hunting for Obama images for his collection of West African signs where caricatures of celebrities--Martin Luther King Jr., Michael Jackson-- promote businesses--barber shops, cell-phone stores—they have no business promoting. Jevremovic was seduced by Sheff’s unfinished picture of Obama. The collector thought the likeness seemed regal even without a mouth, a politician’s favorite asset. To him, the painting had the vitality and nobility of Gilbert Stuart’s famous unfinished portrait of George Washington, a model for [...]