American art in Germany

The Bucerius Kunst Forum in Hamburg, Germany, is a relatively young art center, founded in 2002. It has no permanent collection but mounts four loan exhibitions annually on a variety of themes. Between 2007 and 2009 and in collaboration with the American consulate in Hamburg, the Forum is holding three exhibitions devoted to American painting. With the overall title 150 Years of American Art: 1800-1950, the exhibitions are intended "to provide new and revealing insights into American cultural history--the key to grasping America's art and life today."

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The first show, called New World: Developing an American Art, is on view from February 23 until May 28. It focuses on the rise of landscape painting, particularly the Hudson River school, in the nineteenth century. The organizers point out that this show charts the development of a genuine American school of art inspired by Europe, which then followed its own distinctive path reflecting the creation of a new nation in a new world. Included are about eighty works from the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Connecticut, by such artists as Albert Bierstadt, Frederic Edwin Church, Thomas Cole, and John F. Kensett. The guest curator is Elizabeth Mankin Kornhauser of the Wadsworth Atheneum. She and Ortrud Westheider edited the accompanying catalogue in German, which may be ordered through the Web site (www.buceriuskunstforum.de).

The exhibitions scheduled for 2008 and 2009 are entitled, respectively, High Society: American Portraits of the Gilded Age and Urban Life: Edward Hopper and American Realism.

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