Schlagwort-Archive: Literature

TIPP! Literature

The Making of Peggy Guggenheim

The article “The Making of Peggy Guggenheim”, written by Joanna Moorhead and published in the Observer on the 18. April 2026, explores the short but transformative London gallery venture of Peggy Guggenheim, the pioneering collector who reshaped British perceptions of contemporary art while demonstrating a groundbreaking commitment to supporting women in the art world.

The article recounts how Peggy Guggenheim opened Guggenheim Jeune in 1937, a gallery in a former Piccadilly pawn shop, aiming to establish a British Museum of Modern Art. At that time London’s art scene was mostly conservative and largely indifferent to contemporary art: The Tate frequently rejected contemporary works and abstract sculpture was mostly met with hostility. Despite these challenges, Peggy brought the work of living artists into the city. She launched exhibitions featuring artists like Jean Cocteau, Wassily Kandinsky and Lucian Freud, often facing public outrage and bureaucratic hurdles along the way.

Guggenheim Jeune was also notable for its progressive approach to gender. Peggy intentionally cultivated a team of women curators and advisors, including Wyn Henderson, Mary Reynolds, and Nelly van Doesburg, and significantly exhibited the work of female artists such as Rita Kernn-Larsen and Grace Pailthorpe. By providing opportunities behind the scenes and on the gallery walls, she created a space in which women could participate in a male-dominated cultural sphere.

Despite its short lifespan, closing in June 1939 due to the impending war, Guggenheim Jeune had a lasting impact on British art culture, showcasing abstract sculpture, collage and accessible art sales. The article notes that the London venture not only helped to reshaped modern art appreciation but also laid the foundation for Peggy Guggenheim’s later galleries in New York and Venice, where she continued her legacy as a visionary collector by advancing both – innovative modern art and the recognition of women in the arts.

To learn more about the making of Peggy Guggenheim and her pioneering gallery in London, read the full article here.

REZENSION | Piet Bakker and Judith Noorman: Women’s Vermeers. Maria de Knuijt and new Archival Documentation on Vermeer’s Primary Patron

For a long time, women as collectors and lovers of art were largely overlooked in art history. This is particularly evident in the case of Jahannes Vermeer, whose success was traditionally attributed to the support of the wealthy Delft citizen Pieter van Ruijven. Yet archival material and recent research prove a different picture: His wife Maria de Knuijt was most likely the main patron of Vermeer.

The essay “Women’s Vermeers – Maria de Knuijt and new archival documentation on Vermeer’s Primary Patron” written by Piet Bakker and Judith Noorman on the role of the female art patron Maria de Knuijt is part of the project “The Female Impact: Women, the Art Market and Household Consumption in the Dutch Republic, 1580–1720”, which aims to understand the art market not as a sphere of artists and male patrons but as a part of a household consumption shaped significantly by women.

read More

TIPP! Literature

How This London Collector Is Cultivating the Art of Her Generation

The article “How This London Collector Is Cultivating the Art of Her Generation” by Sofia Hallström published on the february 13th, 2026 in the artsy magazine profiles the London-based female collector, curator and writer Gigi Surel and explores how she approaches collecting art as a deeply personal and generational practice.

Her fascination with art began at age 17 when she encountered Guernica by Pablo Picasso at the Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid. The powerful emotional and physical reaction she experienced in front of the painting inspired her to reflect on the intense impact artworks can have on viewers. Raised in Istanbul, Surel only begun visiting museums regularly in her teenage years, but soon developed a strong passing for art. While studying law in the United States, museums became an important refuge and a way to overcome feelings of isolation for her. By joining museum memberships and acquisition groups at institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, she gradually learned how collecting works and connected with other art enthusiasts.

Her collection now includes works by more than 35 artists – many of them emerging and not yet represented by galleries. The works often revolve around themes such as sensitivity, memory, vulnerability and grief – interests that were partly shaped by Surels father’s illness and death. For Surel collecting is a highly personal and intuitive process, that developed from a passion into a professional path. Today she also writes about art, curates exhibitions and founded the platform Teaspoon Projects, which aims at encouraging and educating new collectors. Through events, conversations and exposure to contemporary art she hopes to make collecting more accessible.

Read the full article to know more about how Gigi Surel built her collection and how she aims to inspire a new generation of art collectors.

TIPP! Literature

The Woman Who Immortalized the Bauhaus

The article ”The Woman Who Immortalized the Bauhaus” by Alice Rawsthorm published on Janurary 23th, 2026 in the photography magazine aperture highlights the work of Lucia Moholy, whose photographs played a crucial role in shaping our visual understanding of the Bauhaus. Though much of what we know about the Dessau building, workshop objects and interiors comes from her iconic pictures, Lucia Muholy’s contribution and impact long remained unrecognized.

Born in Prague in 1894, Moholy studied art history and philosophy before turning to photography in the early 1920s. During her time at the Bauhaus, she produced systematic photographic documentation of its architecture, products, and spaces. Her images are characterized by sharp focus, controlled lighting and an emphasis on form and function – qualities that aligned closely with Bauhaus principles and helped define its public image. Despite the lasting influence of these photographs, Moholy’s authorship was frequently obscured. Her work was often credited to her then husband, László Moholy-Nagy, or to Walter Gropius, the founder of the Bauhaus.

After leaving Germany in the 1930s because oft the upcoming power oft he NS-Regime, she lost control over her photographic negatives, which continued to circulate internationally without her consent. Moholy later engaged in a long and exhausting legal effort to reclaim recognition and rights to her work.

The articles reassessment of Moholy’s role challenges established narratives of the Bauhaus and highlights the structural and institutional conditions that shaped female authorship and visibility within the art scene during that time.

Read the full article to know more about Lucia Moholy’s photographic methodology, the history of her missing and misattributed negatives, and how her work reshapes current understandings of Bauhaus visual culture.

TIPP! Literature

‘Her time has come’: did Mondrian owe his success to a cross-dressing lesbian artist who lived in a Cornish cove?

The article “‘Her time has come’: did Mondrian owe his success to a cross-dressing lesbian artist who lived in a Cornish cove?” published by Joanna Moorhead on January, 12th in The Guardian highlights the British artist Marlow Moss and her long-overlooked contributions to abstract modernism. Once overshadowed by contemporaries such as Piet Mondrian, Moss is now recognized as a pioneering figure whose work influenced Mondrian’s use of parallel lines in the 1930s.

Born Marjorie Jewel Moss in London in 1889, she studied art before moving to Lamorna Cove in Cornwall, where she adopted a short hairstyle and a gender-neutral name. Despite repeated attempts to engage with prominent artists like Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson, Moss’s work was largely ignored during her lifetime.

According to Moorhead, recent exhibitions at the Kunstmuseum Den Haag and planned displays at the Georg Kolbe Museum in Berlin, along with record auction prices for her work, signal a growing recognition of her importance. Biographer Florette Dijkstra attributes this revival to the contemporary art world’s increased focus on inclusivity and diversity, allowing previously marginalized women and queer artists to receive overdue attention.

Read Joanna Moorhead’s full article in The Guardian for a detailed account of Marlow Moss’s remarkable life and legacy.