Recasting Antiquity: Whistler, Tanagra, and the Female Form examines an important moment of encounter between the past and the present, as played out in the work of the American artist James McNeill Whistler. In examining Whistler’s reinterpretation of ancient Tanagras, the Hellenistic terracotta figurines that so captured the imagination of Europe and America following their discovery in 1870, this catalogue and the exhibition it accompanies consider the ongoing legacy of ancient Mediterranean material culture in Western art. More specifically, they question the ways in which the classical female body, as an image and an idea, persisted as a site for exploring issues of beauty, gender, and art itself. Finally, the exhibition invites us to think about the Tanagras in their ancient context, ultimately to wrestle with what it means to represent and look at a female body in any period of history, and how the female body may be fabricated through the media and through the act of being looked at.
For the opportunity to explore possible answers to these questions, and to learn from her deep knowledge of Whistler and his world, Ruth Allen is first and foremost profoundly grateful to Linda Merrill, without whom this exhibition would not exist. She has been a gracious, thoughtful, and inspiring co-curator, co-editor, colleague, and friend.
The authors extend their thanks to artists Darya Fard, Matthew Sugarman, and Ana Vizurraga, who contributed their time, expertise, and creative labor to produce videos on lithography and the two-piece mold process for inclusion in the exhibition. Their work was wonderfully captured by Buff Harsh and Duane Codrington. Ruth Allen is especially grateful to Ana, with whom she shared many hours of conversation, discussing material and technique, the identities of the women who contemplated the Tanagras in antiquity, and the ways in which this project affected our own feelings about ourselves, our bodies, and our place in the world. We also thank Halle Gordon, who offered suggestions on how to bring Tanagra figurines up to date.
At the Carlos Museum, we are grateful to Renée Stein, Ella Andrews, and their students Jada Chambers, Tyler Holman, and Bobby Wendt, whose analyses of the Carlos’s own Tanagra figurines garnered important results that deepened our understanding of these objects’ materiality and context of production. Todd Lamkin, Stacey Gannon-Wright, and Annie Shanley masterfully coordinated loans, and Joe Gargasz, Dave Armistead, Bruce Raper, and Ciel Rodriguez designed and delivered a stunning installation, in collaboration with Mike Nelson and Kirk Leitch at Times3. Thanks, too, must be extended to Elizabeth Hornor, Katie Ericson, Kris Allen, Alice Vogler, Ryan Beresch, Emily Wright, Jennifer Long, Elizabeth Riccardi, Brittany Dineen, Elly Davis, Bernard Potts, Nick Miles, April Wilmer, Henry Kim, Jim Warren, Lisa Fields, Tracy Strickland, Brent Tozzer, Mark Burrell, and our exhibition intern, Maddie Margiotta.
This exhibition could not have come about without the generous collaboration of our colleagues at the Art Institute of Chicago, Colby College Museum of Art, the Georgia Museum of Art at the University of Georgia, the Harvard Art Museums, the High Museum of Art, the Hunterian Art Gallery at the University of Glasgow, the Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the University of Michigan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Terra Foundation for American Art, and Yale University Art Gallery. We extend special thanks to the Louvre Museum and particularly to Violaine Jeammet, senior curator in the Department of Greek, Etruscan and Roman Antiquities, for the loan of eight Tanagra figurines that allowed us to tell the story of Whistler’s—and Europe’s—fascination with the ancient terracottas at the heart of this exhibition.
Linda Merrill extends particular thanks to her ever-collegial co-curator Ruth Allen and to the Carlos Museum for allowing her to explore this phase of Whistler’s production. She is also grateful to Bonna Wescoat who, when interim director of the museum, encouraged her to undertake the project; and to Andrew Farinholt Ward of Emory University, John Siewert of the College of Wooster and Margaret Edson, for their meticulous review of her manuscript and many helpful suggestions and corrections. She also acknowledges with thanks the assistance of Neil Pettigrew, who provided valuable information about his great aunts, and Kim Collins, who managed several key acquisitions for the Stuart A. Rose Manuscripts, Archives, and Rare Book Library. Many professional friends offered assistance beyond the call of duty, including Marisa Bourgoin, Archives of American Art; Malcolm Chapman and Graham Nesbit, Hunterian Art Gallery, Glasgow; Jay Clarke, Art Institute of Chicago; Patricia de Montfort, University of Glasgow; Allison Harig, Shelburne Museum; Eleanor J. Harvey, Smithsonian American Art Museum; Stephanie Heydt, High Museum of Art; Erica Hirshler and Patrick Murphy, Boston Museum of Fine Arts; Kathy Shoemaker, Rose Library; and Jack and Russell Huber, Atlanta.
Finally, we are grateful to Beth Cohen for her contribution to this catalogue, to Madeline Long for her tireless and careful editing, and to Chris Diaz for building this catalogue.