Biography

During the 1970s Professor Weisberg curated The Etching Renaissance in France: 1850-1880 (1971); Social Concern and the Worker: French Prints from 1830-1910 (1973) and Images of Women: Printmakers in France from 1830-1930 (1977). These shows expanded awareness of thematic and contextual issues affecting nineteenth century printmakers.

At the same time his interest in the theme of Japonisme led to co-organizing Japonisme: the Japanese Influence on French Art, 1854-1910 (1975) for The Cleveland Museum of Art. This exhibition was the first show to examine several aspects of the Japanese influence in the west by focusing on paintings, prints and the decorative arts to demonstrate a cohesive impact to this influence.

In 1980, also for The Cleveland Museum of Art (and other museums), Dr. Weisberg organized the large painting and drawing exhibition The Realist Tradition, French Painting and Drawing, 1830-1910. This show helped redefine the parameters of the Realist movement by moving away from sole concentration on Gustave Courbet to see how many other artists - then little appreciated or studied - also made use of a realist style and thematic material that was intricately linked with the history and social concerns of the era.

During the next decade Professor Weisberg maintained his interest in realism by pursuing other aspects internationally and by trying to redefine the international context for naturalism. In a series of books and exhibitions these issues were addressed. In The European Realist Tradition, edited by Weisberg, (Indiana University Press,1982) the larger and broader context of realism was studied in a series of perceptive essays by international authors from the academic and museum communities.

In 1979, with the publication of Bonvin (Paris, 1979), the position of Francois Bonvin (1817-1887) was reconfirmed and he was seen, again, as a purveyor of a seventeenth century Dutch taste combined with an interest in the works of Jean-Simeon Chardin. As the principal expert in assessing Francois Bonvin's work Weisberg is often consulted by dealers, collectors and auction houses throughout the world.

At the close of the 1980s, Weisberg acted as a consulting curator for the exhibition The Art of the July Monarchy, France 1830 to 1848 (organized by the Museum of Art and Archaeology, University of Missouri-Columbia). This show, generously funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts effectively redefined the ways in which artists and printmakers responded to the era of Louis Philippe.

By 1992, Weisberg further extended interest and study on the naturalist painters - both avant-garde and academic - in his book Beyond Impressionism, The Naturalist Impulse (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1992). In isolating the various naturalist painters in several countries - including Eastern Europe and Scandinavia - Weisberg effectively revealed how many artists, of all camps, responded to the utilization of photography to heighten their sense of naturalistic detail. Further interest in the July Monarchy was found in a group of essays, edited with Petra T.D. Chu and published as The Popularization of Images, Visual Culture under the July Monarchy (Princeton University Press, 1994).

Along with an interest in realism and naturalism, Weisberg has researched and published on a host of issues and artists linked to the Symbolist and Art Nouveau movements. In 1986 he curated for The Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service Art Nouveau Bing, Paris Style 1900 (published jointly with Harry N. Abrams, 1986). This show led to the rediscovery of the importance of Siegfried Bing (1830-1905) as the principal promoter of art nouveau design in Europe and to the reappraisal of such artists as Georges de Feure, Edward Colonna and Eugene Gaillard. The reappraisal of these artists is still continuing today.

Weisberg's commitment to art nouveau led to his becoming a principal advisor on Peinture et Art Nouveau, l'Ecole de Nancy (for the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nancy, 1999) and to his contributing to Art Nouveau, 1890-1914, organized by the Victoria and Albert Museum, London with essays to the catalogue on "The Parisian Situation: Hector Guimard and the Emergence of Art Nouveau" and "Moulding Wood: Craftsmanship in Furniture".

In recent years, while expanding on the impact of Japonisme in other locations (e.g. Japonisme Comes to America, The Japanese Impact on the Graphic Arts 1876-1925, 1990) Dr. Weisberg has devoted considerable attention to issues surrounding the recognition, reception and contributions of the academic painters of the nineteenth century. He worked with the Musée des Beaux Arts, Bordeaux on their Rosa Bonheur exhibition in 1997; his contribution was later expanded in his essay for the catalogue published by the Dahesh Museum (New York) on Rosa Bonheur in 1998.

As curator for the Frick Art and Historical Center in Pittsburgh Weisberg discussed the importance of the French academic painters and their reception both in Pittsburgh and the United States revealing that such artists as Pascal-Adolphe-Jean Dagnan-Bouveret and Emile Friant could be effectively discussed in Collecting in the Gilded Age, Art Patronage in Pittsburgh, 1890-1910 (Frick Art and Historical Center, 1997).

Weisberg has recently prepared an exhibition and publication on the little known French academic painter P.A.J. Dagnan-Bouveret (Against the Modern: Dagnan-Bouveret and the Transformation of the Academic Tradition, The Dahesh Museum of Art and Rutgers University Press, 2002). Further evidence of his interest in the ways in which academic art has been taught and transmitted was found in a traveling exhibition he organized with the Trust for Museum Exhibition (1995-96) called Redefining Genre. French and American Painting 1850-1900 (with an essay by Petra T.D. Chu) and in an exhibition co-curated with the Dahesh Museum (New York) on the Académie Julian, a theme discussed in Overcoming All Obstacles, The Women of the Academie Julian (published by the Dahesh Museum and Rutgers University Press, 1999).

As an educator, interested in helping researchers better understand a period or movement, a series of bibliographic references and essays were also prepared. These included The Realist Debate, A Bibliography of French Realist Painting, 1830-1885 (Garland Publishing Inc.,1984), co-authored with Yvonne M.L. Weisberg; Japonisme: An Annotated Bibliography, (Garland Publishing Inc,1990), co-authored with Yvonne M.L. Weisberg and Art Nouveau, A Research Guide for Design Reform in France, Belgium, England and the United States (Garland Publishing Inc., 1998), co-authored with Elizabeth K. Menon.

Dr. Weisberg was recently Guest Curator for "L'Art Nouveau, La Maison Bing" an exhibition organized with the Van Gogh Museum (Amsterdam) and the Musée des Arts Décoratifs (Paris) for November, 2004. This large-scale exhibition of paintings, prints, and decorative art objects continues to examine the entrepreneurial and patronage contributions of Siegfried Bing (1838-1905) the peripatetic art dealer who promoted both Japonisme and Art Nouveau on a worldwide basis. The exhibition compared art nouveau pieces against significant examples of Japanese art that Bing either sold or collected in order to reveal ways in which one area - Japanese art - influenced the other. The exhibition, after opening in Amsterdam, moved onto the Villa Stuck (Munich) and the Caixa Foundation (Barcelona) before ending its run at the Musée des Beaux-Arts (Brussels). A detailed catalogue/book "The Origins of Art Nouveau, The Bing Empire" authored by Weisberg along with his colleagues Edwin Becker and Evelyne Possémé, among others, has been published in at least six separate language editions and was distributed world-wide. In the United States the publication was being distributed by Cornell University Press.

The Bing exhibition and catalogue/book was widely reviewed in the international press. Articles examined the issues raised by the exhibition itself, while further returning Siegfried Bing to a place of genuine importance in the pantheon of impressive tastemakers and entrepreneurs at the end of the nineteenth century.

He has also worked closely with Professor Laurinda Dixon (Syracuse University) in assisting the publication of a series of essays for a volume on "In Sickness and in Health: Disease as Metaphor in Art and Popular Wisdom" (University of Delaware Press/Forthcoming). Another volume of essays: "Montmartre and the Making of Mass Culture", edited by Professor Weisberg was recently published by Rutgers University Press, (2001).

As Reviews Editor for "19th c Art World Wide" Dr. Weisberg is involved with an electronic periodical that is helping to revolutionize the field of international nineteenth century studies. Appearing twice a year, the reviews examine significant exhibitions and books revealing the wide diversity of publications throughout the field.

Dr. Weisberg has recently worked with The Oklahoma City Art Museum on The Artist as Narrator, Nineteenth Century Narrative Art in England and France show (2005) preparing an essay for the catalogue on "The Narrative of the Fields and Streets: Nineteenth Century Rural and Urban Imagery,". This catalogue is being distributed by the University of Washington Press. As an outgrowth from the Bing exhibition, Professor Weisberg edited a special issue of Nineteenth Century Art Worldwide on "Art Nouveau and Siegfried Bing" which appeared in the summer, 2005. He also contributed an essay "Lost and Found: Reconstructing S. Bing's Marketing of L'Art Nouveau" to the same issue of the electronic journal.

Dr. Weisberg also worked with the Portland Museum of Art on the exhibition Paris and the Countryside: Modern Life in Late Nineteenth Century France. This exhibition opened in June, 2006; Weisberg wrote the essay on "The Urban Mirror: Contrasts in the Vision of Existence in the Modern City" for the accompanying catalogue which is being distributed by the University of Washington Press. In a similar vein (although he also served as Co-Curator) he worked with the Oklahoma City Art Museum in preparing "Paris 1900" with an accompanying catalogue that examines the pertinent themes in painting, prints, sculpture and the applied arts that made Paris the center of attention at the end of the nineteenth century. His essay "The Print Culture of Paris 1900," was included in this publication distributed by the University of Washington Press. As an outgrowth of his interest in Japonisme, Dr. Weisberg published "Japanese Art on a Plate, an unknown masterpiece of French Ceramic Design" in Apollo Magazine (London), September, 2006. This article brought back to prominence a large ceramic table service by Henri Lambert completed in 1873 and which, startlingly, and in rich color, employed numerous motifs from a wide-range of Japanese prints.

A continuing interest in contemporary realist painters led Weisberg to prepare an essay on Harvey Dinnerstein. This article, "Harvey Dinnerstein, A Traditionalist for the Future," will be included in a large-scale book on the artist to be published by Chronicle Books in San Francisco, during 2008. An exhibition of Dinnerstein's paintings will be held, at about the same time, at the Frey-Norris Gallery in the same city.

As part of his long-standing commitment to Naturalist painting Dr. Weisberg is serving as Guest Curator for the Van Gogh Museum (Amsterdam) in the organization of a large international painting exhibition tentatively entitled "The Naturalist Illusion: Salon Painting, Photography and Early Cinema," Destined to open in 2010, with the strong possibility the show will go to Paris under the auspices of the Orsay Museum, this exhibition will reveal the international ties of the Naturalist movement while demonstrating how various artists created their works while under the influence of photography. In a similar vein the importance of these associations also influenced the direction of early cinema in Europe and the United States. This section of the show will explore long unknown direct ties with film.

Contact

Gabriel P. Weisberg, Telephone: (612) 340-1408; Fax: (612) 340-1408; email: vooni1942@aol.com.