A major retrospective of Art Deco darling Tamara de Lempicka has opened at the De Young Museum in San Francisco, ranging from some of her most celebrated paintings to lesser-known drawings that are only now getting their deserved attention.
Furio Rinaldi, who co-curated the show with Gioia Mori, said in an emailed interview that the exhibition has been “very popular,” even if many people from the audience “admittedly never heard Lempicka’s name before.”
“They respond passionately to her iconic Art Deco portraits and to the artist’s resilient life journey,” Rinaldi said. “Those from the audience who are more ‘in the know’ have expressed their particular appreciation in discovering the artist’s drawings—her draftsmanship is exquisite—and some lesser-known and rarely seen paintings, like her early Cubist still lifes.”
The show marks the first major retrospective of the artist’s work in the United States, more than four decades after her death. It unites over 120 paintings as well as other Art Deco sculptures and objects from the museum’s collection that help put her practice into historical context.