Experience New York City's Art Scene with the Bryn Mawr Club of New York City

This winter and spring, eminent art consultant Lucille Blair,'76, will conduct tours of some of New York City's most noteworthy museums and galleries for Bryn Mawr alumnae and their friends.

The first tour is scheduled for this coming Saturday, January 23 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Participants will explore the Met's exhibition American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765-1915. The tour will start at 1:00 p.m.

The group will meet Lucille in the museum lobby at the group registration desk.

The charge for the tour is $20 payable in cash only.

Following the tour, group members will convene for coffee, tea, and conversation at the Met's Petrie Court Café. Participants must cover the cost of their own refreshments.

Please note: All participants must pay the full fee. No museum memberships or student/senior discounts can be applied to this event!

To RSVP, please e-mail Bonnie Walker at bhwalker3@gmail.com.

When RSVP'ing, please include your full name and graduation year, along with the full names of any guests that you wish to bring. Time is short, and the tour will be limited to 12 participants.

So please RSVP ASAP!

 About American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765-1915:

Beginning with the period 1765 - 1830, the exhibition displays works of colonial painters who were essentially perceived as tradesmen by their patrons. Portraiture dominated, but, amidst social changes, beginning in 1830, in response to new public exhibition spaces in cities such as New York and Boston, many American artists were finally able to turn away from portraiture and the confines of private commissions and discover new ways of telling their stories-often through genre paintings-scenes of lower and middle class characters shown in every day life.

By 1850, however, on the eve of the Civil War, painters of American stories had turned from the individual and family to far broader issues-namely those of a territorial and political nature. Many outdoor scenes captured an expanding view of American life, including the relationships between blacks and whites, while others explored the vastness of the American landscape which had captured the imagination of their urban audience.

With the Civil War (followed by Reconciliation), from 1860-1877, artists turned their storytelling from the blood being shed on battlefields to more intimate stories played out nostalgically in the countryside. By the mid-1870s, with ready access to travel opportunities, prints, photographs, and magazine illustrations, American painters turned to a more journalistic narrative and were just as likely to paint people enjoying life in Paris as in New England or New York. The American identity was being redefined - with the cowboy, shrinking frontiers, women as household managers, disappearing rural traditions and rising industrialization-and, with the Ashcan artists of the early 1900's, we see occasionally droll images, recorded as if "on the run", reflecting skills that most artists had acquired as newspaper illustrators.

About Lucille Blair, Bryn Mawr '76:

Lucille Blair, '76, began her career at Christie's and has over eighteen years of fine art and business experience. Lucille is a marketing and art consultant for corporations and cultural institutions, ranging from Sotheby's to the Fine Arts Fund of Cincinnati and the Museum for African Art. A long-time resident of New York, Lucille has a keen understanding and love of the city. Through her well-informed insights and extraordinary experience, she is able to offer tour participants new perspectives on and unparalleled access to the many layers of New York City's art world.