Fresno Art Museum goes big with 3 new exhibitions. Check out Andy Warhol, Chester Arnold and Ansel Adams.
That sound you hear at the Fresno Art Museum today (Saturday, Feb. 5) is visitors burbling through the front doors, eager and excited to see a new slate of exhibitions. There’s nothing quite like opening day at an art museum, when everything feels fresh and new. You can feel the energy of discovery in the air.
Pictured above: Andy Warhol’s pop art lines the walls of the Fresno Art Museum. Photo: The Munro Review
And today there’s added significance: This is the first time in the post-vaccine era that there is new art on the walls. That’s something to be happy about.
The headline-grabbing show is a touring exhibition titled “Andy Warhol Portfolios: A Life in Pop, Works from the Bank of America Collection.” It features 94 works of art (most in series) that span 40 years of photographic silkscreen printmaking. Think Campbell’s soup cans, Marilyn Monroe, endangered species, Keith Haring collaboration and more. Just what is Scotch Broth soup, and can you still buy it at the grocery store?
David Kennedy/Radiator Media Chester Arnold’s ‘Apothesis’ at the Fresno Art Museum.
The museum also offers a stunning new original show, a first-time retrospective of the work of Northern California painter Chester Arnold. Featuring 20 large-scale paintings and a number of miniatures, the exhibition fills the front of the museum with a lineup of intriguing narrative images, many of them with fascinating perspectives and dreamy, surreal influences.
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Finally, the museum brings out its big name in a celebration of Ansel Adams’ 120th birthday, using prints from the permanent collection.
I got to take a sneak-peek tour of the exhibitions on Friday. Here’s a quick Facebook Live interview I did with Michele Ellis Pracy, executive director and chief curator:
I’ll be covering each exhibition more extensively in the coming months. They run through June 26.
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