There are a couple of beautiful museums/ galleries in New York that are often overlooked for the larger and more well known museums. These include the Frick, Whitney and Neue. The latter is a gallery devoted entirely to early 20th Century Austrian and German art and design. It was started by Serge Sarbasky and Mr Ronald Lauder - son of the late Estee Lauder - and is housed in a magnificent building on the corner of 86th St and Fifth Ave. It is home to the famous Portrait of Adele Bloch Bauer which was purchased by Mr Lauder for a well publicized price in 2006.
The permanent collection also includes exquisite brooches by Joseph Hoffman and furniture by Adolf Loos:
Anyway, the point is, today I went to their current exhibition "From Klimt to Klee, masterworks from the Serge Sarbasky Collection". It includes paintings and works on paper from Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Oskar Kokoschka, Otto Dix, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner and Emile Nolde, to name a few. Some works have been shown in other shows and others have been rarely seen. If you are a lover of this period of art, it is a wonderful exhibition. Below is a sample of what you will see:
Egon Schiele: Wally in a red blouse with raised knees
Paul Klee:The sick heart
The exhibition runs until Feb 15th 2010. If you are visting New York, do yourself a favor and see it. Even if you come after Feb, put this gallery on your list of "must do's".
Images: sourced from http://www.neuegalerie.org/
