GLOUCESTER – Martha Oaks is Chief Curator of the Cape Ann Museum in Gloucester. In the interview below, she focuses on the Stuart Davis Exhibit that is ongoing until Columbus Day. She also gives an overview of the C.A.M and talks about some of the other exhibits and activities.
Cape Ann Museum Chief Curator Martha Oaks
Stuart Davis (1892-1964), Autumn Landscape, 1940, Gouache on illustration board, Collection of Lawrence A. Rand and Tiina Smith.
© 2023 Heirs of Stuart Davis / Licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY
GLOUCESTER, MASS. (July 2023) – The Cape Ann Museum is pleased to announce the opening of Portrait of a Place: Stuart Davis in Gloucester, an intimate exhibition of paintings and photographs that illustrate the city’s significant artistic influence on Davis. The exhibition, which will be displayed in the center of the Fitz Henry Lane gallery, is being presented thanks to generous individual and institutional lenders, including the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, The Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford. The exhibit will be on view from July 22 to Oct. 16, 2023.
Davis first visited Gloucester in the summer of 1915 at the invitation of fellow painter John Sloan. He wrote that the city “…was the place I had been looking for. It had the brilliant light of Provincetown, but with the important addition of topographical severity and the architectural beauties of the Gloucester schooner.†Sloan moved on to other locations to paint after 1918 while Davis continued to return to Gloucester for many years.
“Stuart Davis’s resonate responses to Gloucester and Cape Ann illuminate how this singularly unique and inspiring place shaped artists in the early 20th century,†said Oliver Barker, Cape Ann Museum Director. “The Museum is thrilled to share these works with audiences in the city that stimulated their creation and remains indebted to Davis’s family for their generosity in providing access to archival materials and photographs which bring this time period so vividly to life.â€
Portrait of a Place: Stuart Davis in Gloucester is the third exhibition to be shown within the galley and in juxtaposition with the suite of spaces that the Museum has dedicated to Fitz Henry Lane’s work. Lane, a Gloucester native son, also noted the city’s “topographical severity†in the landscape, working as a printmaker in Boston for several years before then returning to the city in the late 1840s. Lane preceded Davis by over 50 years, and interestingly both artists explored the area with paper and pencil before returning to their studios to paint, based on their drawings.
“Stuart Davis’s paintings and those done by Fitz Henry Lane are vastly different in composition, palette, and style,†said Martha Oaks, the Museum’s Curator. “Despite these differences, being able to view Davis and Lane together in the same gallery is eye-opening and affirms how the importance of one particular place – Cape Ann – has played in the lives of countless artists over the generations.â€
In connection with the exhibition, a 14-page catalog has been published by the Museum, it is available for purchase in the Museum shop for $5 and includes an essay by Martha Oaks, Chief Curator.
Portrait of a Place: Stuart Davis in Gloucester and an accompanying lecture, Stuart Davis’s Gloucester: The Pungent Aroma of Oil Paint, Fish Cakes, and Glue presented by John X. Christ, Plymouth State University on Saturday, September 16, 2023, at 2:00 pm are part of the Cape Ann Museum’s contribution to Gloucester’s 400+ Anniversary, marking four hundred years since English colonizers first attempted to settle here. Over the course of this year, the Museum is presenting a wide variety of exhibitions and events that both celebrate the best of Cape Ann and acknowledge the important and complex history of this place stretching back more than 10,000 years.
Portrait of a Place: Stuart Davis in Gloucester runs concurrently to Edward Hopper & Cape Ann Illuminating an American Landscape, the first-ever major exhibition devoted to Hopper’s Gloucester years, which opens on July 22, 2023, and runs through October 16, 2023.
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The Cape Ann Museum, founded in 1875, exists to preserve and celebrate the history and culture of the area and to keep it relevant to today’s audiences. Spanning 44,000 square feet, the Museum is one of the major cultural institutions on Boston’s North Shore welcoming more than 25,000 local, national, and international visitors each year to its exhibitions and programs. In addition to fine art, the Museum’s collections include decorative art, textiles, artifacts from the maritime and granite industries, four historic structures, a Library & Archives and a sculpture park in the heart of downtown Gloucester. In Summer 2021, the Museum opened the 12,000 square foot Janet & William Ellery James Center at the Cape Ann Museum Green. The campus is located on the site at the intersection of Washington and Poplar Streets in Gloucester and is open in the summer months.
The Cape Ann Museum is located at 27 Pleasant Street in Gloucester and is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Sunday, 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. General admission is $15.00 adults, $12.00 Cape Ann residents, seniors, and students. Youth (under 18) and Museum members are free. Cape Ann residents can visit for free on the second Saturday of each month. During the Edward Hopper & Cape Ann exhibition, additional fees apply, and timed ticketing is required. More information can be found on www.capeannmuseum.org or please call (978)283-0455 x110.
