Paris Through the Window: Marc Chagall and His Circle Exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art
As a symbol of culture, freedom, and modernity, the city of Paris held a magnetic attraction for artists from Eastern Europe during the early decades of the twentieth century. Most painters and sculptors settled in a vibrant area of Paris known as Montparnasse, which was sprinkled with artists’ residences, cafes, and art galleries; it was here that Alexander Archipenko, Marc Chagall, Moïse Kisling, Jacques Lipchitz, Louis Marcoussis, Amedeo Modigliani, Chana Orloff, Jules Pascin, Margit Pogany, Chaim Soutine, and Ossip Zadkine established studios and discovered each other’s work. This exhibition will include around 40 paintings and sculptures by these emigré artists, all of which were created in a unique atmosphere of mutual encouragement and support in Paris before the Second World War. The exhibition will focus in particular on the paintings that Chagall made between 1910 and 1920, including the artist’s early masterpiece Half Past Three (The Poet), of 1911, which has long been considered one of the great treasures of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
This exhibition was organized by the Philadelphia Museum of Art and is presented in conjunction with the first annual Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts (PIFA), inspired by the Kimmel Center, on the theme of “Paris: 1910-1920.