change over time; their materials carry the stain of what conservators describe as inherent vice. Viewers see paintings that need to rest and heal, bearing marks that suggest, through their surfaces, condition, and textures, metaphors of viscera, bile, and wounds. In the Museum’s six largest galleries, Reynolds’s exhibition asks viewers how they view healing over time, respond with their bodies to this corpus, and how they might approach Still’s achievements from a perspective that contends with his and their own senses of mortality—and with it, a shared desire to hold impermanence. “The exhibition is a poetic meditation on love, grief, and care manifest on the surfaces of Still’s paintings, in conservation records, and inscribed within the most personal and intimate pages written by him and his wife housed in the Archives,” says Joyce Tsai, CSM director. “Still’s art and archives are refracted here through Reynolds’s art and thought, whose work has drawn sustenance from authors Still could never have known. The exhibition illuminates new ways we might all learn to draw strength from Still’s art.” Exhibition Details The exhibition runs from January 25 to September 14. The Still will host various programs and events during the exhibition, including a performance lecture with Reynolds on February 5. Visit clyffordstillmuseum.org/events for a schedule of upcoming programs. Reynolds chose several paintings with condition issues to highlight the impact of conservation throughout the exhibition. One exhibition gallery features the absence of PH-247, known by many as “Big Blue,” which went off view in 2022 after more than a decade on display in the galleries. For the artworks in the collection to maintain and project their visual and emotional power, they must go off view periodically to limit the chemical and physical changes caused by excessive light exposure. Several works on paper, which are particularly light-sensitive, will also be on view in one of the skylit galleries (behind curtains to protect them from excess exposure). Museum
staff tracks the light exposure of paintings and works on paper as part of its ongoing conservation practice. Additionally, Reynolds selected an intriguing collection of archival photographs, letters, and notes to demonstrate the themes and emotions throughout the exhibition. The show also includes two original archival objects, including a barn nail from Still’s studio in Maryland and an exhibition banner of Still’s that hung outside the Met in 1979. The exhibition also features several letters by Patricia Still, including a note about grass growing over the spot where Still’s demolished studio once stood and a page from Patricia’s diary recording Clyfford’s death. The Museum expands on exhibition content in its free mobile guide on Bloomberg Connects. The guide includes audio and video content, plus insights about Reynolds’s curatorial process through the voice of her mother, Margery Handy, alongside archival letters and audio featuring Clyfford Still and his eldest daughter, Sandra. The guide also includes poetry excerpts and behind-the-scenes video highlights. The Held Impermanence guide is available in English, Spanish, and American Sign Language, as well as over forty additional languages via Google Translate. Two resources with additional support and insights are available in the exhibition’s first gallery in a wall pocket. Essays on Held Impermanence, a companion booklet to the exhibition, offers an in-depth look at the way this project came into being, as well as how questions of love, grief, rest, and healing are visible in Still’s work; in Patricia Still’s stewardship of his legacy; and in museum practice. In addition to a director’s introduction, curator’s essay, and gallery overview, the booklet features an extended conversation among guest curator Katherine Simóne Reynolds; chief conservator James Squires; Tom Learner, head of the Getty Conservation Institute; and Joyce Tsai, CSM director, that explores philosophical and emotional questions this exhibition raises for the field of art conservation. The Exploring Feelings and Art: A Family Guide provides conversation starters to help guide
31 The Acumen
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