ART OF FLÂNERIE’ AT NEUBERGER 

WD set 11/14

 

PURCHASE, N.Y. — “Person of the Crowd: The Art of Flânerie” is being presented at the Neuberger Museum of Art, January 20–April 13.

In 1840, Baltimore’s Edgar Allan Poe published the seminal short story The Man of the Crowd. In it, he introduced a character that would become one of the central tropes of literary and artistic modernism: the flâneur (“stroller”), who was the participant-observer of the Industrial Revolution.

This character took to the streets, wandering far and wide, gathering clues to the essence of the modern city by observing its physical fabric and its inhabitants and their public activities. Poe’s man of the crowd was the inspiration for Charles Baudelaire’s “The Painter of Modern Life,” the essay that heralded the arrival of the quintessential artist-flâneurs — the French Impressionists.

“Person of the Crowd: The Art of Flânerie,” an exhibition curated by Thom Collins, director of the Neuberger Museum of Art, surveys recent multimedia art created by avant-garde artists who work in the way first described by Poe and codified by Baudelaire. They join street life in order to make art about postmodern cities around the world and the people who inhabit them.

Among the artists represented are Marina Abramovic, Vito Acconci, Franz Ackermann, Francis Alÿs, Eleanor Antin, Mike Bidlo, Sanford Biggers, Chakaia Booker, Stanley Brouwn, Victor Burgin, Ingrid Calame, Sophie Calle, Guy Debord, Valie Export, Sylvie Fleury, Kendall Geers, Guerilla Girls, Marie-Ange Guilleminot, Lynn Hershman, Tehching Hsieh, Douglas Huebler, Kim Sooja, Moshekwa Langa, Margaret Kilgallen, Mingwei Lee, Nikki S. Lee, Barry McGee, Philip Lorca diCorcia, Annette Messager, Josephine Meckseper, Donald Moffett, Mariko Mori, Helio Oiticica, Jefferson Pinder, Adrian Piper, Robert Rauschenberg, Martha Rosler, Ed Ruscha, Hope Sandrow, Fiona Tan, Nari Ward, Gillian Wearing, David Wojnarowicz and Zhang Huan.

The museum is at 735 Anderson Hill Road. For information, 914-251-6100 or www.neuberger.org.