The MET Hosts The Birth of Impressionism Free Lectures, Begins 10/16

Stéphane Guegan, curator, Musée d'Orsay and Gary Tinterow, Engelhard Chairman, Department of Nineteenth-century, Modern, and Contemporary Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art are the featured speakers Saturday, Oct. 16, 2010, at 10:00 a.m. at the Janet and Jim Ayers and Marlene and Spencer Hays Lecture Series planned during the opening weekend of The Birth of Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Musée d'Orsay, which opens to the public Oct. 15, 2010, at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts.

The lectures will take place in the Frist Center Auditorium and will be followed by a panel discussion moderated by Elizabeth Easton, director of the Center for Curatorial Leadership in New York, N.Y. The Janet and Jim Ayers and Marlene and Spencer Hays Lecture Series is free and open to the public.

The Lecturers

Stéphane Guegan, one of the two curators of The Birth of Impressionism, will speak at 10:00 a.m. on the topic, "Manet versus Impressionism." A key figure of the New Painting and Spanish taste of the 1860s, Édouard Manet changed his style after 1871, a pivotal year in French history that Victor Hugo designated the "terrible year." The evolution in Manet's style has raised many interpretive misunderstandings that continue today. Guegan will discuss the possibility of looking at this problem from a new perspective through The Birth of Impressionism exhibition.
Gary Tinterow's lecture, "The French Taste for Spanish Painting and the Development of Early Impressionist Painting," will begin at approximately 11:00 a.m. His talk will examine the ways in which the masters of Spain's Golden Age-Velázquez, Murillo, Ribera, El Greco and Zurbarán-influenced nineteenth-century French artists including Delacroix, Courbet, Millet, Degas, Renoir, and, most notably, Manet.

In 1838, King Louis Philippe of France inaugurated the Galerie Espagnole at the Louvre, placing on view his extraordinary collection of hundreds of Spanish paintings, which left an indelible impression in France. By the 1860s, the French taste for Spanish painting was perceptible at each Paris salon. Tinterow will discuss these influences, which can be seen in many of the works on display in The Birth of Impressionism.
The Exhibition

The Frist Center is one of only three venues, worldwide, to host this magnificent exhibition from the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, which is dedicated to the art of the early modern period (1840s through the early 20th century). The exhibition, which includes 100 works (including 17 that will be seen only in Nashville), includes paintings by Courbet, Manet, Cézanne, Renoir, Bouguereau, Degas, Fantin-Latour and Whistler, whose Arrangement in Gray and Black, No. 1: Portrait of the Painter's Mother (often called Whistler's Mother will be on view in the exhibition.
Exhibition Tickets Now on Sale

Advance timed tickets for The Birth of Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Musée d'Orsay are now on sale through www.fristcenter.org (additional charges apply) and on site at the Frist Center. Tickets also include admission to Chihuly at the Frist.

Admission prices for this specially ticketed exhibition:

Visitors 18 and younger FREE

Frist Center Members FREE

Adults $15.00

Seniors (65+) $12.00

Active duty military $12.00

College students with ID $12.00

Groups of 10 or more (with reservations) $13.00 per person

Thursday and Friday evenings from 5:00-9:00 p.m., college students with ID will be admitted for $5.00.

Group reservations may be made by calling the group tour coordinator at (615) 744-3247.
Frist Center Members may make advance reservations by calling (615) 744-3248.

Exhibition Sponsors

The Frist Center gratefully acknowledges The Birth of Impressionism sponsors:
Platinum Sponsor: The HCA Foundation on behalf of HCA and the TriStar Family of Hospitals
Gold Sponsor: First Tennessee
Silver Sponsor: Dream Systems
The Frist Center for the Visual Arts is supported in part by the Metropolitan Nashville Arts Commission and the Tennessee Arts Commission.

The Birth of Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Musée d'Orsay is organized by the Frist Center for the Visual Arts with gratitude for exceptional loans from the collection of the Musée d'Orsay.

The Birth of Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Musée d'Orsay is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and Humanities.

About the Frist Center

Accredited by the American Association of Museums, the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, located at 919 Broadway in downtown Nashville, Tenn., is an art exhibition center dedicated to presenting the finest visual art from local, regional, U.S. and international sources in a program of changing exhibitions. Gallery admission to the Frist Center is free for visitors 18 and younger and to Frist Center members. Frist Center admission for The Birth of Impressionism is $15.00 for adults and $12.00 for seniors, military and college students with ID. During The Birth of Impressionism, college students are admitted for $5.00 Thursday and Friday evenings, 5-9 p.m. Discounts are offered for groups of 10 or more with advance reservation by calling (615) 744-3247. The Frist Center is open seven days a week: Mondays through Wednesdays, and Saturdays, 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m.; Thursdays and Fridays, 10 a.m.-9 p.m. and Sundays, 1-5:30 p.m., with the Frist Center Café opening at noon. Additional information is available by calling (615) 244-3340 or by visiting our Web site at www.fristcenter.org.