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For Immediate Release

Contact:
Lee Ortega, Director of Marketing and Public Relations
Phone: 305.673.7530 ext. 9-2001
E-mail: lortega@bassmuseum.org

MIAMI BEACH, FL - (May 21, 2009) - Framing the Altarpiece celebrates the re-installation of one of the Bass’s masterpieces, The Coronation of the Virgin, attributed to Sandro Botticelli and Domenico Ghirlandaio, and re-introduces several significant Renaissance altarpieces from Italy, Spain, Germany, and the Netherlands. Altarpieces that once functioned as religious objects within churches were also works of art, recognized as such today in the secular space of the museum or private collection, an ambiguity mediated, then and now, by their frames. This exhibition explores the relation of the frame to the altarpiece, sculpture to painting, abstract decorative to naturalistic elements, the material to the immaterial, thereby revealing how the modern painting, hanging on the wall as the creation of an exceptional individual, derives from a crucial transition in Medieval and Renaissance art.

Other works included in the exhibition are Madonna and Child Enthroned with Music-Making Angels and Saints by Giovanni Mazone (Barbagelata), c. 1433 – 1512; Four Wings of a Passion Altar, Master of the Revaler St. Elizabeth Legend, Active c. 1480-1500; and The Crucifixion Triptych by Cornelis Cornelisz van Haarlem, 1562-1638. The single greatest example, The Ghent Altarpiece of 1432, has famously posed a riddle for art history. Framing the Altarpiece argues that this exceptional work embodies a unique transition from Gothic cathedral sculpture to illusionist painting, reflected in all of the altarpieces in the Bass collection.

The Bass Museum’s new Adjunct Curator Benjamin Binstock, a specialist in Renaissance and Baroque Art, earned his PhD. in art history at Columbia University in 1997, after study in Aix-en-Provence, Amsterdam, Berlin and Berkeley. He has published widely on Rembrandt, Vermeer, Carel Fabritius, and the history and theory of art history and aesthetics. His recent book Vermeer’s Family Secrets. Genius, Discovery, and the Unknown Apprentice (Routledge: 2009) offers a radical revision of current scholarship, including his controversial claim that Vermeer’s eldest daughter Maria painted several of the works now attributed to her father. Binstock has taught at Columbia, New York University, the CUNY Graduate Center, and now at the Cooper Union in downtown Manhattan. He was a visiting member of the Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton and the American Academy of Berlin, and created and directed Derrida Month at New York University in 2000, in which Jacques Derrida participated shortly before his death.

Framing the Altarpiece: The Birth of the Modern Painting out of the Spirit of the Gothic Cathedral is on view to the public in the Gertrude Silverstone Muss Gallery from April 9 – July 18, 2009.

Bass Museum of Art
2121 Park Avenue (in Collins Park), Miami Beach, Florida 33139 T: 305.673.7530
www.bassmuseum.org

Admission
$8 general admission/ $6 seniors students. Free for members and children under 6. Group discounts available.

Museum SUMMER HOURS and Docent Tours (June through September 2009)
Wednesday-Sunday 12-5pm. The museum will be open 9am-5pm November 3-November 6, 2009. Free with museum admission. To schedule a group tour call 305.673.7530 x 9-1013

Bass Museum Shop
An eclectic selection of art, architecture and photography books; folk art from around the world; one-of-a-kind decorative and gift items; jewelry by local and international artisans; postcards; and educational toys. Open during museum hours and selected special events.

WiFi Snack Bar@the Bass Museum Shop
A cheerful, cool relaxing spot in the Bass Museum Shop offering fresh coffee, tea and sweet treats during museum hours. Free WiFi.

Parking
Metered parking lot on site. Additional metered parking is available on perimeter streets.

The Bass Museum of Art is generously funded by the City of Miami Beach, Cultural Affairs Program, Cultural Arts Council; with additional support provided by Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs, the Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade Mayor and the Board of County Commissioners; State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs, the Florida Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts; and Friends of the Bass Museum, Inc.