The graphics section of these two shows has a considerable amount of explanation about the processes that Bearden used to create his prints. Ordinarily I don't think that knowing anything about an artist's process is helpful, but here it's useful. But seeing at the prints in their various states and proofs and the different colors he tried gives a sense of the meticulous care Bearden took with each stage of the work.
In a jazz performance the endless hours of arrangement and preparation are hidden from the audience, as they should be. For this artist, and this show, seeing the pains that Bearden took with his work affirms the sense of the great worth of these pieces.
Ken Greenleaf can be reached atken.greenleaf@gmail.com.
"FROM PROCESS TO PRINT: GRAPHIC WORKS BY ROMARE BEARDEN" "COLLAGES BY ROMARE BEARDEN" |at Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick | 207.725.3275
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The power of 'Cool', Deep cuts, A special Maine feel, More 
- The power of 'Cool'
"New York Cool" is required viewing for anyone who has an interest in contemporary American art. Comprised of nearly 80 works, the show, at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art through July 19.
- Deep cuts
The beauty of Kara Walker's silhouettes lies in their concurrent brutality and daintiness, and in her unabashed exploration cutting to the meat of the black-and-white binary in American contemporary culture.
- A special Maine feel
This may be remembered as the year that the Center for Maine Contemporary Art smashed headlong into a fiscal brick wall, and at this writing it is not clear if, after its current show closes this week, it will open again in the spring.
- Hope and energy
As we launch into the next decade with a collapsing economy and apocalyptic themes bleeding into every facet of culture, it's particularly hard to be optimistic about the arts, as yes, they are often the first to go.
- An expanding world
Housed in two galleries at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, “Methods for Modernism: Form and Color in American Art, 1900 to 1925” presents a healthy survey of works by artists featured in the two most definitive venues for introducing European modernism to America.
- Stand-alone sketchbook
Widely considered to be one of the most influential sculptors in the formation of British and international modernism, Henry Moore (1898-1986) drew from classical traditions, surrealism, and primitivism in his obsession with capturing the female form in all of its dimensions.
- Take a seat and consider the chair
Richard Prince's 2008 "Nurse Hat Chair" sits next to a gothic French "Joined Chair" in the first gallery of the extensive "Sit Down!" — book-ending the six centuries of chairs represented in the exhibit.
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"Was he a cynic, an enthusiast, or merely an aesthete of rough seas?" Rhetoric scratched across a cresting wave sets the dissonant tone of "Repeater Pencil," Raymond Pettibon's 14-minute single-screen animation, which wavers between a decorated apathy and dire fatalism.
- Review: R. Crumb illuminates the Bible at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art
The Book of Genesis seems like inherently good fodder for R. Crumb's satirical debasement.
- Chinese bronzes from thousands of years ago at Bowdoin
Chinese bronzes are often felt, quite rightly, to fall within the purview of scholars and collectors who delight in detailed changes from one period or region to another.
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There are many different ways to talk about Lesley Vance's paintings, yet we don't really have the right words yet.
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Museum And Gallery
, New York University, New York University, Visual Arts, More
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