WYES Steppin’ Out host Peggy Scott Laborde speaks with Louisiana Life art columnist John Kemp about the NOMA exhibition Pride of Place: The Making of Contemporary Art in New Orleans, currently on view through September 3, 2017. Pride of Place showcases a selection of 20th-century paintings, drawings, photographs and sculptures recently donated to NOMA by prominent New Orleans gallerist and art collector Arthur Roger.
Over the years, Arthur Roger nurtured artists through his art gallery opened in 1978 and in doing so, helped shape and promote the art scene of his native city. Joining the list of benefactors, he recently gifted his sizable art collection accumulated over four decades to the New Orleans Museum of Art. The eighty-seven objects, including paintings, sculptures, videos, photographs, are on display this Summer for the exhibition Pride of Place: The Making of Contemporary Art in New Orleans, curated by Katie Pfohl, Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at NOMA.
When Arthur Roger launched his gallery in 1978, there were only a handful of others focused on new art. The scene has expanded greatly since then, but Roger has more than kept abreast of the ever-changing art world through the years, as we see in this sprawling new exhibition of works from his personal collection, which he donated recently to the New Orleans Museum of Art.
It’s a safe bet to say that the contemporary art scene in New Orleans would be a lot less interesting without Arthur Roger. For nearly 40 years, his gallery has been a focal point for introducing the city to major currents in the national and international art scene, as well as for launching and nurturing the careers of some of the most prominent New Orleans-based artists working today.
[Arthur Roger’s] donation — paintings, sculpture and photography by local and national luminaries of modern art — comprises a new NOMA exhibit, “Pride of Place: The Making of Contemporary Art in New Orleans.” The exhibit opens Friday and runs through Sept. 3. In the exhibit’s 143-page catalog, museum Director Susan M. Taylor describes the gift as “transformational.” It “significantly expands” NOMA’s contemporary art holdings and “reaffirms the museum’s commitment to the work of local New Orleans artists,” she said.
Pride of Place: The Making of Contemporary Art in New Orleans (on view June 23–September 3, 2017) celebrates Arthur Roger’s gift of his entire personal art collection to the New Orleans Museum of Art. The exhibition catalogue features a conversation between John Waters and Arthur Roger.
Pride of Place: The Making of Contemporary Art in New Orleans (on view June 23–September 3, 2017) celebrates Arthur Roger’s gift of his entire personal art collection to the New Orleans Museum of Art. The exhibition catalogue features an important essay by William Fagaly, Personal Recollections: Contemporary Art in New Orleans.
Dawn DeDeaux opens a new exhibition May 28, 2017 as part of the grand opening of Building 6 at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA).
On June 1, Arthur Roger’s personal collection of paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs and mixed media pieces will be taken off his walls, packed away and carted over to the New Orleans Museum of Art. He recently donated more than 80 pieces to the museum, including works by national and regional artists such as Luis Cruz Azaceta, Willie Birch, Douglas Bourgeois, Robert Colescott, George Dureau, Robert Gordy, Deborah Kass, Catherine Opie, Robert Polidori, Holton Rower and John Waters, among others.
