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In the Library: Selections from the Dwan Gallery and Virginia Dwan Archives

September 30, 2016 – January 29, 2017
East Building, Study Center Library

Edward Kienholz and Dwan Gallery assistants move a sculpture by Jean Tinguely into his solo exhibition (Los Angeles, May 1963). Photo courtesy Dwan Gallery Archives.

This exhibition is no longer on view at the National Gallery.

Overview: In conjunction with the exhibition Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959–1971, the National Gallery of Art Library will present documentary material drawn from the library collection as well as the Dwan Gallery Archives and Virginia Dwan Archives. The installation will provide a deeper look into Dwan Gallery’s operations, highlighting its evolution as it shifted from a West Coast venue for established New York and European avant-garde artists in the early 1960s to become one of New York’s leading galleries devoted to new movements including minimalism, conceptual art, and land art in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The library installation will also offer a view of gallerist and patron Virginia Dwan’s relationships with the artists she represented and befriended. Posters, announcements, and catalogs—along with ledger books, exhibition checklists, and correspondence—tell the stories behind some of Dwan Gallery’s most significant shows. Also included are Virginia Dwan’s personal correspondence and photographs, which document events such as Niki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely’s visits to California, excursions with Robert Smithson, Sol Lewitt, and Nancy Holt, and visits to the earthworks that Dwan sponsored in the western United States, including Michael Heizer’s Double Negative. The exhibition will conclude with a presentation of Dwan’s promised gift to the library: a copy of Carl Andre’s Seven Books of Poetry, copublished by Dwan Gallery and Seth Siegelaub in 1969.

Organization: Organized by National Gallery of Art, Washington.

Brochure: Selections from the Dwan Gallery and Virginia Dwan Archives by Yuri Long and Paige Rozanski. Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 2016. 

Tinguely, Jean
Swiss, 1925 - 1991
Smithson, Robert
American, 1938 - 1973
LeWitt, Sol
American, 1928 - 2007
Holt, Nancy
American, 1938 - 2014
Heizer, Michael
American, 1944 -
Andre, Carl
American, 1935 - 2024
Issue, 1966/2016
Video, Released: February 13, 2018, (4:34 minutes)
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery
Video, Released: January 10, 2017, (23:37 minutes)
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959 – 1971, VI: Some Art Is Hard to See: Field Trips with Virginia Dwan
Audio, Released: January 3, 2017, (41:38 minutes)
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959 – 1971, V: Liberating Artist and Exhibition: 
Dwan Gallery and the Reconceptualization of Site
Audio, Released: December 27, 2016, (41:38 minutes)
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959 – 1971, IV: Rethinking Minimalism
Audio, Released: December 13, 2016, (41:38 minutes)
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959 – 1971, III: Tableaux in Three Dimensions: Kienholz’s Social Theater at Ferus and Dwan
Audio, Released: December 6, 2016, (41:38 minutes)
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959 – 1971, II: Learning from LA
Audio, Released: November 29, 2016, (43:13 minutes)
Discoveries from the Dwan Gallery and Virginia Dwan Archives
Video, Released: November 22, 2016, (28:47 minutes)
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959 – 1971, I: West Coast, East Coast
Audio, Released: November 22, 2016, (41:38 minutes)
Discoveries from the Dwan Gallery and Virginia Dwan Archives
Audio, Released: October 11, 2016, (28:47 minutes)
Conversation with Collectors: Virginia Dwan and James Meyer
Video, Released: October 4, 2016, (64:25 minutes)
Conversation with Collectors: Virginia Dwan and James Meyer
Audio, Released: October 4, 2016, (64:25 minutes)
Press Event: Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959–1971
Audio, Released: September 27, 2016, (11:45 minutes)
Jean Tinguely, "Odessa"
Video, Released: September 27, 2016, (2:10 minutes)
Jean Tinguely, "Portrait of Virginia"
Video, Released: September 27, 2016, (1:31 minutes)
Virginia Dwan, Journey to Southern Mexico
Video, Released: September 27, 2016, (3:51 minutes)