Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture, the first major museum exhibition to explore how gender and sexual identity have shaped the creation of American portraiture, organized by and presented at the National Portrait Gallery last fall, will be on view at the Brooklyn Museum from November 18, 2011, through February 12, 2012. With the cooperation of the National Portrait Gallery, the Brooklyn Museum has reconstituted the exhibition in concert with the Tacoma Art Museum, where it will be on view from March 17 through June 10, 2012.
Hide/Seek includes works in a wide range of media created over the course of one hundred years that reflect a variety of sexual identities and the stories of several generations. The exhibition also highlights the influence of gay and lesbian artists who often developed new visual strategies to code and disguise their subjects’ sexual identities, as well as their own. Hide/Seek considers such themes as the role of sexual difference in depicting modern Americans, how artists have explored the definition of sexuality and gender, how major themes in modern art—especially abstraction—were influenced by marginalization, and how art has reflected society’s changing attitudes.
Museum Director Arnold L. Lehman states, "From the moment I first learned about this extraordinary exhibition in its planning stages, presenting it in Brooklyn has been a priority. It is an important chronicle of a neglected dimension of American art and a brilliant complement and counterpoint to Youth and Beauty: Art of the American Twenties, a touring exhibition organized by the Brooklyn Museum, also on view this fall. "
In addition to its commentary on a marginalized cultural history, Hide/Seek offers an unprecedented survey of more than a century of American art. Beginning with late nineteenth-century works by Thomas Eakins and John Singer Sargent, the exhibition traces the subject of gender and sexuality with approximately one hundred works by masters including Romaine Brooks, George Bellows, Marsden Hartley, and Georgia O’Keeffe. It continues through the postwar periods with works by Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Agnes Martin, and Andy Warhol. The exhibition addresses the impact of the Stonewall Riots of 1969, the AIDS epidemic, and the advent of postmodernism and themes of identity in contemporary art. The exhibition continues through the end of the twentieth century with major works by artists including Keith Haring, Glenn Ligon, Nan Goldin, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, and Catherine Opie.
Brooklyn Museum: HIDE/SEEK: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture
Workshop: Gender Expression and Variation:
Thursday, December 1, 5–8 PM
In this three-hour workshop, teens will visit the exhibition, HIDE/SEEK: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture, and discuss the role of art in exploring gender identity. In the studio, a professional teaching artist will work with participants to create art about identity in its broadest terms.
HIDE/SEEK: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture In Conversation: Larry Kramer and Jonathan Katz:
Thursday, December 1, 7 PM
In commemoration of World AIDS Day, the Brooklyn Museum presents Larry Kramer, author of the Broadway hit The Normal Heart, in conversation with Jonathan Katz, curator of HIDE/SEEK. Kramer will discuss his seminal play in response to the AIDS epidemic in America in the 80s, and how the issues that faced the gay community and America’s social/political landscape continue to be urgent and relevant till this day. Tickets, which include Museum admission, are $10 ($6 for members and cultural colleagues). Seating is limited, and advance ticket purchase is recommended via www.musuemtix.org.
