Rago Arts and Auction Center hosts an open house on Tuesday, May 8, featuring a talk by Dr. Robert Cozzolino, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Senior Curator and Curator of Modern Art.
Dr. Cozzolino will discuss the distinctive character of Pop in Chicago during the 1960s. In exploring popular culture source material, artists trained in that city, such as Roger Brown, Jim Nutt, Ed Paschke, Christina Ramberg and Ray Yoshida built on the region’s deep tradition of dark humor and unexpected treatments of the body. The result probed the underbelly of American culture through comics and advertising to ask serious questions about society in the midst of change.
Dr. Cozzolino joined Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 2004. As Senior Curator and Curator of Modern Art, he has organized numerous exhibitions, including “George Tooker: A Retrospective,” and “Liz Osborne: The Color of Light.” He has also brought many significant acquisitions into PAFA’s permanent collection, including The Linda Lee Alter Collection of Art by Women, which will debut in an exhibition this Fall at PAFA. Dr. Cozzolino lectures frequently in a wide range of contexts, serves on public discussion panels, conducts numerous studio visits with artists, serves as a visiting critic in studio programs, and is often called on to be a juror for competitive exhibitions. His publications include essays on Henry Ossawa Tanner, Magic Realism and Photography, Modernism in Chicago, and Salvador Dali’s late work.
The talk takes place during preview week for Rago’s Fine Art auctions, to be held on Saturday, May 12, featuring 19th/20th C. American and European Art, the Reingold Collection of Sculpture and Reliefs, and Post-War and Contemporary Art.
The auction house opens on Tuesday, May 8 at Noon. A reception begins at 5 pm. Dr. Cozzolino will speak at 6 pm.