This week, WGBH News' Arts Editor Jared Bowen reviews two new exhibitions, one at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and one at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.
“Frida Kahlo and Arte Popular,” on view at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston through June 16.
The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston presents its first ever exhibition of one of Mexico’s most celebrated artists. “Frida Kahlo and Arte Popular” features eight examples of the artist’s work alongside about 40 objects of and relating to “arte popular,” or Mexican folk art. The exhibition traces the evolution of Kahlo’s painting alongside the folk art she collected and interacted with, and how the political atmosphere surrounding the Mexican Revolution shaped the country’s arts and culture.
“Because of the myths around her, and her visibility in popular culture, it actually becomes quite radical to ask basic questions about her,” assistant curator Layla Bermeo said. “What were her inspirations? What types of art was she looking at? What were the professional milestones in her career? ... That's the part of her that this project is trying to explore.”
“Botticelli: Heroines + Heroes,” on view at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum through May 19.
Two paintings by Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli have been reunited outside of Europe for the first time at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. In “Botticelli: Heroines + Heroes,” the artist relates devastating scenes of rape and murder in “The Story of Lucretia” and “The Story of Virginia.” They are politically charged paintings both for his time and ours.
“Botticelli is interpreting stories from ancient Roman times, and contextualizing them in terms of the political struggles of his own day,” director Peggy Fogelman said. “Now we can look at Botticelli's works and interpret them through the lens of the political struggles in our time.”
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