October 16, 2016 – February 12, 2017
El Segundo Museum of Art presents Experience #25: BRAIN, opening on Sunday, October 16 at 10 a.m.
An introduction by Marc Pachter, Director Emeritus, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, is scheduled for 2 p.m. The art experience will run through February 12, 2017.
Putting a name to a face can sometimes be a challenge. But seeing intelligence through a face? Leave that to ESMoA. The art laboratory located on Main Street in El Segundo, California, will be opening eyes to the under-appreciated phenomena of typology in art through portraiture of some of the sharpest intellects of our time with Art Experience 25: BRAIN, featuring iconic works of photographer Peter Badge exploring the faces of Nobel Prize recipients.
The study of “types” is often used in reference to distinct disciplines such as anthropology, archaeology, linguistics, and more. ESMoA’s Art Experience 25 proposes that if the human BRAIN has a face, we should be able to discover it in the faces of those whose intellects have excelled, innovated, achieved, and been recognized for their contribution to humankind by the Nobel Foundation in Sweden.
BRAIN presents a cabinet of people – and very smart people at that – for the people. Viewers who venture through the svelte exhibition space of ESMoA will be able to look deep into the eyes and feel close to some of the brightest lights on the planet. The exhibition will be populated with 400 portraits of Nobel Prize recipients across all categories: from Jimmy Carter (Peace, 2002) to Doris Lessing (Literature, 2007); Serge Haroche (Physics 2012) to Roger D. Kornberg (Chemistry, 2006); Peter Mansfield (Medicine, 2003) to Robert Mundell (Economics, 1999) and myriad more – some widely familiar, others less so.
The portraits will be combined with notes from individual Nobel Laureates. From scribbles to flowing prose, the notes reveal how even the grandest, most ingenious thoughts can start with an idea and a few non-verbal scrawls. Copies of notes will be offered for the taking, the better for viewers to contemplate at home on their own. Who knows what creative thinking they may spark?
As captured by photographer Badge, the comprehensive series provides a fascinating glimpse at the under-appreciated phenomenon of typology in modern art, as well as an opportunity to see what the BRAIN of homo sapiens looks like. A native of Hamburg, Germany, Badge launched his career as a freelance artist before turning 20, and later relocated to Berlin to study art history. Work in freelance photography for magazines gave way to personal projects, with Badge’s portraiture often focused on noted personalities from the arts.
As always, admission is FREE!
For additional information, visit the website at http://esmoa.org/.
El Segundo Museum of Art is located at 208 Main Street in El Segundo.