The age of Picasso and Matisse

The Art Institute of Chicago's opportunity to host the International Exhibition of Modern Art, better known as the Armory Show, in 1913 set a radical new course for modern and contemporary art in the United States. This monumental exhibition introduced audiences to some of the greatest avant-garde artists working in Europe, and forever changed the aesthetic landscape for artists, critics, collectors, and arts institutions. This fascinating publication brings together over 130 masterpieces from the Art Institute, which holds one of the finest collections of European modern art in North America. Following an introductory essay by Stephanie D'Alessandro on the history of collecting modern art at the Art Institute, the masterworks of the museums collection are presented in discrete sections devoted to important movements such as Expressionism, Cubism, Dada, Abstraction, and Surrealism, and to individual artists such as Brancusi, Chagall, Kandinsky, Leger, Matisse, and Picasso, as well as the remarkable American artist Joseph Cornell.