Desert Jewels: Dazzling Discoveries On Display

Fashion and jewelry fans will want to take note of our new exhibition Deserts Jewels: North African Jewelry and Photography from the Xavier Guerrand-Hermès Collection. It pulls together more than 90 pieces of hand-crafted jewelry and dozens of photographs from Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Egypt, and Tunisia collected by Xavier Guerrand-Hermes, of the famed Paris-based fashion house.

Many of the ornate necklaces, bracelets, rings, and earrings in the exhibition have not been publicly displayed before, which makes them even more special to behold. It’s also fascinating to see how these object, crafted decades ago in a time and place far removed from our own, continue to inspire today’s contemporary jewelry designers. To illuminate that connection, we invited jewelry expert Kate Egan to tour Desert Jewels and discuss her favorite pieces. Egan is particularly well-known in Philadelphia for her sharp eye. She studied photography and earned her MFA at the University of Pennsylvania and later worked alongside famed jewelry designer Ted Muehling. In 2008, Egan opened her boutique, Egan Day, in Rittenhouse Square, where jewelry is elevated to true art.

What follows is a slideshow of Egan’s favorite pieces in the exhibition, along with her thoughts and comments on why each piece is especially note-worthy or just worth a second glance. Click here to launch the slideshow.

Image credits: All images from the exhibition catalog, Desert Jewels: North African Jewelry and Photography from the Xavier Guerrand-Hermès Collection by Kristyne Loughran and Cynthia Becker, © 2008.

Late Renoir: The Countdown Has Begun!

Opening June 17, 2010
Late Renoir follows the renowned painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir through the final—and most fertile and innovative—decades of his career. At the height of his creative powers and looking toward posterity, Renoir created art that was timeless, enticing, and worthy of comparison to the greatest of the old masters, such as Raphael, Titian, and Rubens.
 
Watch this space for a sneak peak of the exhibition!
 
Image credit: Girl in a Red Ruff, 1896; Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Bequest of Charlotte Dorrance Wright, 1978

Mom Blogger Tweetup

Thanks to all the mom bloggers who passed the kids off to dad, or the babysitter, and came out to celebrate the finale of Picasso and the Avant-Garde in Paris with us last Friday, April 30th. Here's the Flickr photo stream from the gathering. We lucked out with amazing weather, and some pretty tasty cocktails. Stay tuned for more blogger events at the PMA. Have a suggestion for one? Email it to us!

Picasso Playlist: Like Cubism To Your Ears

We asked Alan Lopez (left), a producer in NYC whose knowledge of music culture blows us away, to create a Picasso-inspired playlist. Check out his comments and curated picks, below, which you can download from iTunes and listen to while walking through our exhibition. Start with track #1 in the first gallery and work your way through the musical art journey...

1. To Be Continued...
Ben Frost, from "School Of Emotional Engineering"

A suitable intro. A hint of darkness, but also quite lovely.

2. Poems
Tricky, Terry Hall and Martina Topley Bird, from "Nearly God"

"You promised me poems..." At turns beautiful and sad. This song seems to be constructed atop layers of diethyl ether and absinthe. Pablo would have liked this one.

3. Godspeed
Modeselektor, from "Happy Birthday!"

A perpetual motion machine of a track, Modeselektor evoke the playfulness in the avant-garde that is sometimes overshadowed by the seriousness of the ideologies behind the movement.

Picasso Phillies Photo Contest!

We're celebrating the final week of Picasso and the Avant-Garde in Paris, which ends on May 2. In honor of Picasso, we're giving away tickets to another hometown favorite, the Phillies!

To enter our giveaway, simply snap a photo of yourself wearing your favorite Phillies gear (hat, jersey, etc) anywhere in the Museum where photography is permitted (so, not in the special exhibition galleries).

Post your photo to the Philadelphia Museum of Art Facebook page or share it via Twitter using the #PABLO hashtag by Sunday, May 2.

The best photo will be featured on the Picasso Posse Blog, and the winner will receive a $100 gift certificate for Philadelphia Phillies tickets, plus two tickets to our upcoming exhibition Late Renoir, opening June 17, 2010.

Additional details....

Where in the World is Picasso?

"Give me a museum and I’ll fill it,” Picasso once said. That’s exactly what several museums around the country are doing this spring—filling their galleries with some of the Spanish artists’s masterpieces. From New York City to Seattle, Picasso is appearing all over the arts scene. Here are a few exhibitions to explore, in addition to our own at the PMA.
By Picasso blogger Silvana Pop

“Picasso: Themes and Variations”
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Now through August 30, 2010
Exploring Picasso’s creative process through the medium of printmaking, this exhibition highlights over 100 of the popular artist’s prints, tracing his development from the early years of the 20th century to his discovery of Cubism.

Picasso Countdown!

We are in the final week of Picasso and the Avant-Garde in Paris at the PMA! If you haven't seen the exhibition, come check us out. And if you have, come back and show us more love. In the meantime, read this funny blog post about Picasso's penchant for stripped shirts. Maybe you'll be inspired to snap a photo in your hippest boating shirt and send to us on Facebook -- in the sartorial spirit of Picasso. Copycats welcome.