Fauvism Cubism Expressionism surrealism

Some works of art are part of the collective imagination without the knowledge of what Museum they are. This is the case of monumental Seurat, "Breakfast on the island of la Grande Jatte", which shows and picnickers with exceptional work on light and colours. It is also the case of the Edward Hopper painting, "nighthawks", which shows, in a learned chiaroscuro, a couple, one evening, at the counter of a desert bar in a cinema setting. Or even of "American Gothic", canvas painted in 1930 by Grant Wood, with the hero, very close-up, farmers represented in a realistic style the man takes a fork near his face, the woman, anxious to air, look elsewhere...

Look no more: all these works, and many others also notable, can be found at the Art Institute of Chicago. The leaders of the establishment say even in paintings Impressionist and post-impressionnistes, the Museum would at the head of the second collection in the world after Orsay. Open at the end of the 19th century, the institution received tirelessly for a stream of donations of informed collectors.

It is a Museum in universal vocation of the design to the Chinese art of armor to contemporary painting. But its specificity is its location: Chicago. It is the city of modernity in architecture. The eye and the spirit of the people there are ready, perhaps more than elsewhere, to "consume" a certain pictorial vanguard. The latter is now on the walls of the Museum. The tradition is respected, since it is a defining feature of our time architect chose to build the modern wing of the Art Institute.

It is Renzo Piano, who imagined a vast 24,000 m2 glass cage for the majority of the works of the 20th and 21st centuries. At the top of the building he designed a semitransparent roof which recreates the "ideal", Zenithal, light of the workshops of artists. "I wanted to be a place of silence and contemplation, a metaphysical place out of time", says Italian architect, who lives in Paris. The classic has the merit of perfectly fade in works of art. In good weather, it is entirely bathed impressive filtered natural light.

Aesthetic experience

Large Bay Windows also open on the Park of the Millennium with, in the Middle, the construction extravagant and spectacular of Frank Gehry, Pritzker Pavillion, for outdoor concerts. That is, on the third floor, that was redeployed the collection of modern art a selection of 350 paintings and sculptures, which proposes a chronological tour of the history of art from before the second world war. For a year, all this modern collection has been cleaned, réencadrée and réaccrochée. Surprise even regulars.

It all begins with a grand Picasso, blue period, "The old guitarist" (1901-1904), which shows a paltry and live character who seems earned by death. Fauvism, Cubism, Expressionism, surrealism... The different movements move with the acquisitions of local donors. "Chicago is a modern city where it is naturally collected modern art", confirms the curator Stephanie of Allesandro.

This gives amazing sets. The Art Institute has for example a group of paintings by Matisse of first importance. The painter considered "The bathers at the river" as one of five keys of his career. The 3.9 metre canvas painted between 1913 and 1916, has evolved with the dramatic events of the world conflict. What was to be a painting which showed the paradise has been transformed into a work divided into several segments hosted by inspired by primitive art characters.

To the immense glass Bay which opens on the city, seven pieces from Brancusi have been arranged. Stephanie D'Alessandro says that for this engagement she took advice of Renzo Piano team who had already operated at the Centre Pompidou in the Brancusi workshop. The "white nigger", head of fish mouth in heart on pedestals juxtaposed stone and wood, has never been much valued. There is a dialogue between the Interior and exterior of the Museum. A unique aesthetic experience linking art, architecture and urban planning.