MARY BOURKE DEBUTS HER FIRST ILLINOIS MUSEUM EXHIBITION LIVING MATTERS AT NATIONALLY RECOGNIZED ELMHURST ART MUSEUM

Reading Your Tea Leaves

MARY BOURKE DEBUTS HER FIRST ILLINOIS MUSEUM EXHIBITION LIVING MATTERS AT NATIONALLY RECOGNIZED ELMHURST ART MUSEUM

A Personal Collection of Forty-Five Oil Paintings Spanning Twenty-Two Years of Imagery From the Artist's Personal and Family Life -May 16 to September 12, 2010

-CHICAGO, IL, February 16, 2010 – Chicago artist Mary Bourke, will debut her solo exhibition, Living Matters, on May 16, 2010 at the Elmhurst Art Museum (150 Cottage Hill Ave., Elmhurst, IL). Named Chicago Magazine's “Best Suburban Museum,” the EAM handpicked Bourke to exhibit her 45 oils. As the only museum in the country designed and built around a Ludwig Mies van der Rohe house, the EAM’s nationally recognized design will serve as the perfect creative backdrop for the exhibition. Living Matters will run from May 16 to September 12, 2010 and will feature paintings with images drawn from the artist's personal and family life, each carefully choreographed with theatrical imagery influenced by Ancient, and Classical traditions. The works revolve around the themes of life: the passage of time, uncertainty, peril, the mystery of death, and the celebration of life. 

“I deliberately insert images into my pieces that allow an observer to question, ponder and draw their own conclusions—as they would with a poem or work of literature,” says Bourke.

Bourke has an MFA degree in Painting from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She elects to be unrepresented and paints solely for herself in her home studio. She currently resides in River Forest, Illinois. The Living Matters exhibition, consisting of forty-five works (all but one from her personal collection), have been private from the outside world until now; making this her premier Illinois museum exhibit.

The characters in her work are carefully choreographed with theatrical imagery and are often composed within Egyptian, Roman, and Greek subject matter. The Renaissance and Baroque masters are some of her revered mentors. In Shakespearean terms: “All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players.” Her interest in masks, costuming, fantasy, and theatrical settings lend mystery, magic, and intrigue to her performers. Examples of Bourke’s Living Matters exhibition works include (*images of the paintings are at the bottom of the release):

·    Reading Your Tea Leaves | Oil on Canvas | 24” x 20” | 1993: In this self-portrait we see the artist in Venetian Renaissance dress. She stares at the viewer with fearful, questioning eyes wondering what the future may hold, what the tealeaves will say. Her sons are depicted over one shoulder while a male image symbolizing her husband is over the other. The teacup, a family heirloom, reinforces the painting’s element of time.

·    The String of Gravity | Oil on Canvas | Lower 55” x 41” Upper 25” x 71” | 1994: This split  composition is a unique configuration within this exhibit. The lyrical beauty of the outdoor scene perfectly captures an innocent moment in time, one where the child and his world seem in perfect harmony. A kite, a symbol of innocent freedom, is depicted in the upper section that canopies and protects the balanced scene below. Lower section from the collection of Marshall and Jamee Field. 

·    The Conspirators | Oil on Canvas | 20” x 27” | 2001: The Baroque era broke from Renaissancetraditions of compositional order. Figures were painted in dramatic poses with strong chiaroscuro effects of light and dark, pictorial effects introduced by Caravaggio (1573-1610) in the early 17th Century. In France, George de La Tour (1590-1652), in some of his most memorable paintings, used candles as the light source to illuminate his compositions. His St. Joseph from 1642 in the Louvre and St. Joseph’s Dream from 1645 in the Musée des Beaux-arts, Nantes, exemplify these dramatic techniques. The Conspirators is clearly influenced by these earlier traditions lending a mysterious, sinister stillness to the conspirators with their unknown intent. In the composition the artist has painted a self-portrait and is pictured with one of her twin sons and an attendant knight. 

·    The Six Ages of Man and Woman | Oil on Double-Sided Wooden Folding Screen | Twelveimages on three panels-each panel 50” x 17 1/2” | 2009-2010: The folding screen for these paintings was found in the attic of the artist’s home. It was originally painted with a design of flat balloons and appeared to date from the 1930s or ‘40s. The artist removed these images and re-gessoed the individual panels.  

The Ages of Man is a known subject in the history of art. Numerous artists have tackled the theme, most notably Titian in his Three Stages of Man from 1512, in the National Gallery of Scotland, and Caspar David Friedrich’s Three Stages of Life from 1836, in Leipzig, Germany. In literary form, none is more famous than the monologue spoken by the melancholy Jaques in Shakespeare’s As You Like It. The speech compares the world to a stage and life to a play, and catalogues the seven stages of a man's life (sometimes referred to as the seven ages of man). Bourke has chosen a different format. There are six ages of Man’s life on one side of the screen and six ages of Woman’s on the other. The images represent Infancy, Childhood, Golden Youth, Parenthood, Middle Age, and Death and Transfiguration. (Golden Youth—Man depicted.) 

Bourke’s husband, Barry Bauman, a nationally-renowned Painting Conservator, will curate the exhibition and has written and designed an 80-page color catalog featuring the Living Matters paintings. The catalog will be available at the museum. The two met when Bourke was referred to Bauman to fix one of her paintings; the rest is history and the artistic couple is on their 26th year of marriage.

Her husband, twin sons, and parents are often chosen as models. She has elected to use her own image for seven of the compositions.  Distinct visual themes are interwoven throughout her work. She often sees a world filled with danger, perils, pitfalls, enemies, and confusion. It is the celebration of life that is deep rooted throughout Bourke’s paintings. Life does have uncertainty and peril; these are very real living matters and yet, in the end, Living Matters.

Exhibition sponsors include: Suburban Bank & Trust, The DuPage Community Foundation, Illinois Arts Council, and the City of Elmhurst. For press inquiries please contact Kristen Tischhauser at Kristen@graceprgroup.com. 
  

ABOUT MARY BOURKE: LIVING MATTERS EXHIBITION Living Matters, at the Elmhurst Art Museum from May 16 to September 12, 2010, highlights forty-five works of art spanning twenty-two years of imagery. The artist's debut Illinois museum exhibit will feature images drawn from her personal and family life each carefully choreographed with theatrical imagery influenced by Ancient, and Classical traditions. The works revolve around the themes of life: the passage of time, uncertainty, peril, the mystery of death, and the celebration of life. An 80-page color catalog written and designed by Barry Bauman will be available at the museum. Bourke’s work is not for public sale.  

ABOUT ELMHURST ART MUSEUM (150 Cottage Hill Ave., Elmhurst, IL) Exhibiting late 20th Century American Art, EAM offers exhibitions ranging from national touring works to local emerging and mid-career Chicago and Illinois artists.  The AIA award winning building was designed around McCormick House, one of only three Ludwig Mies van der Rohe designed residences.  EAM’s mission is to enrich the lives of its visitors by broadening their knowledge, increasing their sensitivity to the fine arts, and sparking the development of their own creative talents.  Fifteen miles west of Chicago and adjacent to the Metra West train line, the Museum offers public tours, programs, guest lectures, and art classes.  Hours: Closed Monday, Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday: 10am-4pm, Wednesdays: 1pm-8pm, Fridays and Sundays: 1pm-4pm Admission: The museum is open free to the public on Tuesdays, Adults-$7.00, Seniors-$5.00, Students-$5.00, Children under 12 and members-FREE.  For more information, call (630) 834-0202, or visit www.elmhurstartmuseum.org.