1956 in art explained

Events from the year 1956 in art.

Events

• March 1 – Replica statue of the Discus Thrower dedicated in Washington, D.C., as a gift from the Italian government to commemorate the return of looted art objects after World War II.^[1]
• March  - 56 Group founded, to promote modernist art in Wales. Subsequently renamed 56 Group Wales.
• September 17 – Release in the United States of the biographical film Lust for Life with Kirk Douglas portraying Vincent van Gogh and Anthony Quinn as Paul Gauguin.
• Le mystère Picasso, a French documentary film, shows Pablo Picasso in the act of creating paintings for the camera (which he subsequently destroys so that they will exist only on film).
• William Klein publishes his photo essay New York, 1954 - 55.
• Shanghai Art Museum, the predecessor of the China Art Museum, opens.
• English curator Jim Ede settles at Kettle's Yard, Cambridge, England.
• English painter Edward Seago joins a tour of the Antarctic.
• Two attacks are made on Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa in the Louvre, Paris.^{[2] [3]}

Awards

• Archibald Prize

William Dargie – Mr Albert Namatjira

• Kate Greenaway Medal – Edward Ardizzone for Tim All Alone

Films

• Lust for Life

Works

• Laurence Bradshaw – Monument to Karl Marx at Highgate Cemetery, London (including bronze bust)
• Alexander Calder – Red Mobile
• Frank Cadogan Cowper – The Golden Bowl
• Salvador Dalí – Living Still Life
• M. C. Escher – Print Gallery (lithograph)
• Max Ernst – L’oiseau Rose
• Helen Frankenthaler – Eden
• Richard Hamilton – Just What Is It that Makes Today's Homes So Different, So Appealing? (collage)
• Rudolf Hausner – The Ark of Odysseus
• Eduardo Kingman – La Lavendera
• Roy Lichtenstein – Ten Dollar Bill (lithograph)
• O. Winston Link - Hotshot Eastbound (black-and-white photograph)^[4]
• L. S. Lowry – The Floating Bridge
  • • Joan Mitchell Café^[5]
  • Hemlock^[6]
• Candido Portinari – Self-portrait
• Norman Rockwell – The Scoutmaster
• Kay Sage – Le Passage
• Alexander Nikolayevich Samokhvalov – Cafe Gurzuf
• Charles Sheeler – On a Shaker Theme
• David Wynne – Sir Thomas Beecham (bronzes)

Exhibitions

• August 9 - September 9 – This Is Tomorrow, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, featuring principally the interdisciplinary ICA Independent Group, including early examples of Pop Art.^[7]

Births

• January 2 – Lynda Barry, American cartoonist
• January 19 – Junpei Satoh, Japanese Western-style painter
• February 24 – Fiona Graham-Mackay, née Bain, British portrait painter
• May 25 – Andrea Pazienza, Italian comics artist (d. 1988)
• date unknown
  • Lee Bae, South Korean visual artist
  • Emma Biggs, English mosaicist
  • Cornelia Parker, English sculptor and installation artist
  • Veronica Ryan, Montserrat-born British sculptor
  • Mackenzie Thorpe, English painter and sculptor

Deaths

• January 13 – Lyonel Feininger, German American painter and cartoonist (b. 1871)
• April 23 – Cecile Walton, Scottish painter, illustrator and sculptor (b. 1891)
• May 3 – Peter Watson, English arts benefactor (murdered) (b. 1908)
• June 8 – Marie Laurencin, French painter and engraver (b. 1883)
• June 11 - Frank Brangwyn, Welsh painter (b. 1867)
• July 26 – Louis Raemaekers, Dutch painter and cartoonist (b. 1869)
• August 7 – LeMoine FitzGerald, Canadian painter (b. 1890)
• August 11 – Jackson Pollock, American painter (b. 1912)^[8]
• August 16 – Theodor Pallady, Romanian painter (b. 1871)
• November 3 – Jean Metzinger, French painter (b. 1883)
• December 16 – Nina Hamnett, British painter, model and designer (b. 1890)
• Mohamed Nagy, Egyptian painter (b. 1888)

See also

• 1956 in Fine Arts of the Soviet Union

Notes and References

1. Web site: Discus Thrower (sculpture). Art Inventories Catalog. Smithsonian American Art Museum. 2012-04-19.
2. News: 2008-04-27. Faces of the week. BBC. 2006-09-29. live. https://web.archive.org/web/20140803042520/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/5392000.stm. 2014-08-03.
3. Web site: 2010-01-07. Mona FAQ. Mona Lisa Mania. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20090601155641/http://www.monalisamania.com/faq.htm. 2009-06-01.
4. Web site: O. Winston Link. Hotshot Eastbound, Iaeger, West Virginia. July 1957 | MoMA.
5. Web site: Café .
6. Web site: Joan Mitchell . 3 May 2022 .
7. Book: Livingstone, Marco. 1990. Pop Art: a Continuing History. registration. New York. Harry N. Abrams, Inc..
8. [Kirk Varnedoe|Varnedoe, Kirk]