SBMA Paintings

In December when I brought a curator from Minneapolis to see the paintings galleries at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art I realized, to my surprise, that there was little I was proud to show him. And yet, I’ve always been impressed with SBMA’s collection. What happened? First, the Preston Morton Gallery was filled with […]

American Art at SBMA

The post-van Gogh rehang of the permanent galleries at SBMA features a selection of largely 19th-century American painting (perhaps in fulfillment of the 1958 commitment to Preston Morton in consideration of her gift of 50 paintings). While maybe a third were seen in the 2012 exhibition, “Scenery, Story, Spirit,” most of the others are new […]

Van Gogh in Santa Barbara

The exhibition “Through Vincent’s Eyes” at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art disabused me of two long-held ideas about Van Gogh’s art: 1. That his style was a reaction to Impressionism, and 2. That he never painted a bad picture. Before I get into my critique, however, I should commend curator Eik Kahng and the […]

Italian Art from Glasgow

During the run of “Botticelli, Titian, & Beyond” at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art I took a quick tour through the corresponding galleries of Italian painting at the Metropolitan Museum in New York. I know it’s not fair to compare Glasgow’s collection with the Met’s, but it’s equally naïve to judge the works from […]