A Triple Play of Exhibitions at Guild Hall
Three new exhibitions — “Recollection: Selections From the Permanent Collection,” “Yektai,” and “Pamela Topham” — will open on Saturday at Guild Hall and remain on view through Dec. 31.
“Recollection” will feature both important works from the museum’s holdings as well as rare and unusual pieces. Organized by Jess Frost, the museum’s associate curator and registrar, it is the first of an annual series and coincides with a digitization project that will enable greater educational access to the holdings.
Among the highlights are Fairfield Porter’s “The Plane Tree,” from 1964, and Elaine de Kooning’s “Bacchus #63,” from 1982. The close-cropped foliage in Porter’s painting and the absence of a horizon line suggest a formal relationship to such Abstract Expressionist works as Ms. de Kooning’s.
At first known for his hard-edged geometric paintings, in the 1970s Al Loving began constructing banner-like works from brightly colored strips of canvas, a process born out of his African-American family’s quilting tradition. The exhibition includes one such work, his “Untitled” from around 1975.
Frank Stella’s “Lanckorona III,” 1971, made from fabric, felt, wood, acrylic, and canvas, is another rarely seen work from the collection that will be on view. Ms. Frost will lead a gallery talk on Oct. 29 at 2 p.m.
“Yektai” features the work of Manoucher Yektai and his sons, Nico and Darius, all of whom live on the South Fork. Born in Tehran in 1921, Manoucher spent several years in Paris after World War II before moving in 1947 to New York City, where he studied at the Art Students League and found himself part of the emerging New York School.
By 1951 he was exhibiting at the Grace Borgenicht Gallery, as were such contemporaries as Joan Mitchell and Milton Avery. His abstract paintings from that period were characterized by heavy painterly impasto and an emphasis on the physical presence of the paint.
His later work, which was marked by increased figuration and less reliance on the trowel and palette knife, encompasses the human figure, the landscape, and still life.
Nico, who was born in Iran in 1969, began making furniture for his parents as a teenager and has focused ever since on unique, utilitarian objects. He works primarily with wood, concrete, and glass to create pieces that “have a visual energy that transcends their solid form,” according to Christina Strassfield, Guild Hall’s museum director and chief curator, who organized the exhibition.
Born in Southampton in 1973, Darius knew early on that he, too, wanted to be an artist. His work moves fluidly between painting and sculpture, often blurring the distinction between the two. Many of his sculptures are created from old paint tubes used by his father and wood remnants discarded by his brother.
A panel discussion with Nico and Darius, moderated by Ms. Strassfield, will take place on Nov. 11 at 3 p.m. A reading of Manoucher’s poetry is set for Dec. 2 at 11:30 a.m.
Miss Topham was awarded top honors in Guild Hall’s 77th annual Artist Members Exhibition by Marla Prather, who was at the time curator for the development of modern and contemporary art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Working from detailed colored pencil drawings as well as from sketches and multiple photographs, she translates the colors and textures of the East End’s land and seascapes into tapestries that use traditional and nontraditional tech niques.
In her words, “I weave on a high-warp tapestry loom using wool, silk, and linen in varied textures and hues to form the foreground, while fine gradations of wool and silk capture the interplay of the ever-changing relationships of earth, sea, and sky in the distance.” Ms. Topham will give a gallery talk on Nov. 4 at 3 p.m.