Matisse in Transition: Around Laurette
Through April 16, 2006

Matisse in Transition: Around Laurette is the first in-depth examination of this fascinating period of the artist's career-1916 to 1919-when he began to paint in series. This dossier exhibition will examine two of the major works in the collections of the Norton and the Guggenheim: Laurette with Long Locks, 1916 and The Italian Woman, 1916, as well as numerous other examples from among the many studies and more formal portraits of Laurette (whose surname is unknown).

The period from 1916-1919 marked a turning point in Matisse's career. First, he created the austere pair of Stein portraits in 1916, which led directly to a suite of nearly forty works devoted to his new model, Laurette. With this group, Matisse initiated a major transition in his art. For the first time, he began to paint in series, as he would continue to do during his subsequent years in Nice.

Approximately twenty paintings and numerous related drawings, lent from public and private collections in both Europe and America, will be on view at the Norton.

The Norton's freshly-cleaned Portrait of Marguerite, which entered its collection in 1986, was painted during the same period and will also be featured in the exhibition. Prior to its acquisition by the Museum the painting had been considered "lost" or missing for several decades. Marguerite was the artist's daughter; her mother was not Mme Matisse, but she was accepted in the family and lived with them, growing up as the older sister of Jean and Pierre.

Institutions lending works include the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou; the Art Institute of Chicago; and the Brooklyn Museum of Art. The numerous private lenders include descendants of the artist himself.

The exhibition catalogue has been authored by world-acclaimed Matisse scholar Jack Flam.

This exhibition has been organized by the Norton Museum of Art. Support of this exhibition is being provided in part by Melvin and Claire Levine, Anne and Harold Smith, Office Depot, The Contemporary and Modern Art Council, The Dr. Henry and Lois Foster Endowment for the Exhibition of Contemporary Art, The Sydelle and Arthur I. Meyer Endowment Fund, the R.H. Norton Trust, Starbucks Coffee Company and by the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs, the Florida Arts Council, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Local media support provided by The Palm Beach Post, Palm Beach Daily News, WPTV NewsChannel 5 and WXEL 90.7 FM.

Betye Saar: Extending the Frozen Moment March 18 - June 4, 2006

Betye Saar is widely viewed as one of the most distinguished figures in American art today. Born in 1926 in Los Angeles, she emerged in the 1960s as a seminal figure in the redefinition of African American identity in art. Throughout her career, Saar has made art that challenges us to think about our societal responses to race and to the history of race in the United States. Though politically trenchant, Saar's work moves beyond protest to encompass a profound spirituality and an awareness of the things that link human beings across cultural lines and across time. Best known for her richly evocative assemblages of found objects, Saar has been included in numerous exhibitions and is represented in many major museum collections. This exhibition examines Saar's achievement by focusing on her work with photography, specifically, her incorporation of photographic fragments as a metaphor for her view of the African American experience and of lives too often obscured in American visual history.

This exhibition is organized and circulated by the University of Michigan Museum of Art. It has been made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Arts, The Henry Luce Foundation, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts and the Peter Norton Family Foundation.
Support for the local presentation of this exhibition is being provided by The Georgene and Hamish Maxwell Exhibition Endowment and the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs, the Florida Arts Council, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Local  media support is provided by the Sun-Sentinel.