"Incredibly Atrocious," Wrote Nixon on Modern Art

A portrait of 37th President Richard M. Nixon painted by Norman Rockwell in 1968. [Credit: National Portrait Gallery]

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A 30-page memo released Monday by the National Archives reveals that the 37th President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, thought of modern art as "decadent" and "incredibly atrocious."

In a memo of January 26, 1970 to his Chief of Staff, H.R. "Bob" Haldeman, Nixon wrote, "As you, of course, know, those who are on the modern art and music kick are 95 percent against us anyway. I refer to the recent addicts of Leonard Bernstein and the whole New York crowd." He continued, "When I compare the monstrosity of Lincoln Center with the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, I realize how decadent the modern art and architecture have become."

Nixon went on to categorize modern art as something the "Kennedy-Shriver crowd" encouraged. "But I have no intention whatever of continuing to encourage it now," he declared. "P.S.," Nixon concluded, "I also want a check made with regard to the incredibly atrocious modern art that has been scattered around the embassies of the world." The embassies, he wrote, "were loaned some of these little uglies from the Museum of Modern Art in New York."

The 30-page modern art memo is among 280,000 pages of previously unseen documents, 12 hours of sound recordings and 7,000 images from the personal collection of White House photographer Oliver F. Atkins, all released this week by the National Archives and the Nixon Library in Yorba Linda.

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"Incredibly Atrocious," Wrote Nixon on Modern Art

MoMA Designs a Bauhaus Retrospective

NEW YORK, NY — From architecture, industrial design, textiles and furniture, to graphics, painting and sculpture, the 20th century art movement known as the Bauhaus continues to influence our modern world (all one has to do browse the latest IKEA catalog for examples). In its first major exhibition dedicated to the Bauhaus since 1938, the Museum of Modern Art is celebrating the extraordinary artists, architects and designers of the avant-garde school.

The Bauhaus school was founded in 1919 and existed in three German cities: Weimar (1919-1925), Dessau (1925-1932) and Berlin (1932-1933), under three different architect-directors: Walter Gropius, Hannes Meyer, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. The school was closed by the Nazi regime in 1933.

The Bauhaus aesthetic declared that there should be no distinction between form and function; art should meet the needs of society. The works are characterized by sleek simplicity, often incorporating industrial materials like wood and tubular steel, shaped by clean edges and geometric lines. The design isn't comfy, cozy per se, but it can certainly add sophisticated style to a room.

On Sunday, Workshops for Modernity: Bauhaus 1919-1933 opened at the MoMA; a retrospective exhibit featuring over 400 works by famed artists including Vasily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, László Moholy-Nagy, Oskar Schlemmer and Josef Albers.

“The content of the exhibit is as much student work as masters’ work…it is a portrait of a school," said Barry Bergdoll, co-curator and The Philip Johnson Chief Curator of Architecture and Design at MoMA. "[The Bauhaus school] believed that if you combined modern design and practicality and utility, the public would be converted,” Bergdoll said.

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Workshops for Modernity: Bauhaus 1919-1933 (Nov. 8, 2009 - Jan. 5, 2010)

Museum of Modern Art | Website

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Read More - How the Bauhaus School Is Still Influencing Modern Design | New York Magazine

[Photos: Top Left - Marcel Breuer. Nesting Tables (B9), 1924-26. | Top Right - Christian Dell. Wine pitcher, 1922. | Bottom - Vasily Kandinsky. Designs for wall-paintings for the Juryfreie Kunstschau (detail), 1922.]

MoMA Designs a Bauhaus Retrospective

The 82-Story MoMA Monster Is Coming to New York City

NEW YORK, NY -- The Museum of Modern Art's plans to alter the New York City skyline have finally been approved. Between debates over height specifications and speculations as to whether architect Jean Nouvel would quit the project altogether, it seemed the 82-story tower would never materialize. But on Wednesday, the City Council approved the construction of 1000-foot building, nicknamed the "MoMA Monster." The spire will be erected next to the museum, located in Midtown Manhattan on West 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth avenue.

The stunning skyscraper will provide the MoMA with a significant 40,000 square feet of new art gallery space. 150 residential apartments and 100 hotel rooms will also be housed in the tower. Just imagine - one of most influential museums of modern art in the world will be called home by some lucky future residents. And the rest of us can look forward to making hotel reservations.

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[Read More - All Stories About 53rd West 53rd Street | Curbed]

The 82-Story MoMA Monster Is Coming to New York City

LAPD Chief Calls It a Cow Splat, But Is It Art?

LOS ANGELES -- Artist Peter Shelton has called his mammoth bronze sculpture "sixbeaststwomonkeys" and "animaline," but Los Angeles police chief William Bratton has another name for it - "some kind of cow splat." The $500,000 sculpture (not yet formally named) is installed outside the back of LAPD headquarters. Though the artist set out to create a "playful and provocative" work, his art is provoking negative responses from some of the staff inside, including the outspoken chief Bratton.

"An unwanted thing just suddenly landed here. I just don't get that, and we are stuck with it," Bratton said in an interview. Some critics don't understand what the massive structure is supposed to represent, others question whether this was money wasted in a time of economic crisis.

Shelton, who has exhibited at prominent art institutions, including New York's Whitney Museum and the Museum of Modern Art, is pleased with his work. After 10 years working on public art projects he looks forward to going back into the studio.

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[Read more - Bratton, Artist at Odds Over Sculpture at LAPD HQ | San Francisco Examiner]

LAPD Chief Calls It a Cow Splat, But Is It Art?

American Feminist Artist Nancy Spero (1926-2009)

"I have come to the conclusion that the art world has to join us, women artists, not we join it. When women are in leadership roles and gain rewards and recognition, then perhaps 'we' (women and men) can all work together in art world actions." ~Nancy Spero

NEW YORK — Figurative artist Nancy Spero died of respiratory complications on Sunday. She was 83. Originally from Cleveland, Ohio, Spero and her husband of 53 years, painter Leon Golub, lived together in New York City until his death in 2004. The couple met while studying at the Art Institute of Chicago.

An active feminist, Spero's focus was primarily the representation of women from various cultures throughout history. Her works combine drawing, painting, collage and printmaking techniques to reflect her strong ideals. The artist has exhibited at prominent institutions such as New York's Whitney Museum and the Museum of Modern Art, and a retrospective of her work is scheduled at the Centre Pompidou in Paris next year.

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[Read more - Nancy Spero, Artist of Feminism, Is Dead at 83 - Obituary | New York Times]

American Feminist Artist Nancy Spero (1926-2009)

The Painter of Black and Light: Soulages at the Pompidou

"Painting is a play of opacities and transparencies."  ~Pierre Soulages

PARIS -- The Centre Pompidou is putting on a major retrospective to celebrate the work of an artist who the museum calls, "the greatest painter on the current French scene." Approaching his 90th birthday, Pierre Soulages, nicknamed the "painter of black and light," is recognized as a major figure in the genre of abstract art.

Following a National Museum of Modern Art show in 1967, the Centre Pompidou held its first large scale exhibition of Pierre Soulages in 1979. This autumn's show looks back at over 60 years of painting and offers a new reading of the artist's oeuvre, with emphasis on more recent developments in his work.

Soulages brings together over a hundred major works dating from 1946 to the present day, from the striking walnut stain works executed between 1947 and 1949 to the paintings of recent years. The collection displays the dynamism and diversity of the artist's constantly evolving approach. Most of the paintings are being shown for the first time.

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Soulages (Oct. 14 - March 8, 2010) @ Centre Pompidou | Website

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The Painter of Black and Light: Soulages at the Pompidou