Past Meets Present in Upcoming Racine Art Museum Exhibition

Opening February 9, 2022 at the Racine Art Museum (RAM), Precedents: Past meets Present in Contemporary Glass and Clay will offer new contexts for understanding how motifs and decorations resurface regularly through generations, how much variety is possible within the dynamic of objects made in a certain material of relative size, and how artists might look at each other’s work for inspiration. This exhibition will be on display at the downtown Racine museum through September 24, 2022.

Artists gather influences from an almost endless variety of sources including cultural, social, and historical people, places, and ideas, as well as personal experiences and perspectives, and even the work of other artists and creatives. Whether or not an individual contemporary artist is directly inspired by an object or image from the past, it can be useful to compare and contrast recent creations with older similar examples.

While RAM's permanent collection contains a wide array of art media, Precedents was specifically spurred by the recent acquisition of numerous nineteenth-century glass goblets and mid-twentieth-century ceramic vessels. A selection of contemporary goblets—part of a gift to RAM from Alan and Barbara Boroff and the Kohler Foundation, Inc. of more than 100 works from various artists—will be paired with historic pieces. The goblets of Fritz Dreisbach and James Minson, to name just two, reflect contemporary approaches that incorporate tradition yet also expand upon it. Small-scale ceramic vases and bowls from early-twentieth-century producers—such as Van Briggle Pottery and Weller Pottery—will be paired with works from later in the century. These contemporary pieces will include brilliantly-colored Feelies from Rose Cabat and a patterned vessel from Acoma Pueblo maker, Margaret Ascencio.

Exhibitions at Racine Art Museum are made possible by: Platinum Sponsors—Judith and David Flegel Fund, Nicholas and Nancy Kurten, Wingate Foundation; Diamond Sponsors—Osborne and Scekic Family Foundation, Ruffo Family Foundation; Gold Sponsors—Anonymous, David Charak, Tom and Irene Creecy, Herzfeld Foundation, Ron and Judith Isaacs, National Endowment for the Arts, Racine Community Foundation, Trio Foundation of St. Louis, W.T. Walker Group, Inc., Wisconsin Arts Board; Silver Sponsors—A.C. Buhler Family, Andis Foundation, Lucy G. Feller, Ben and Dawn Flegel, Johnson Financial Group, Bill Keland, Dorothy MacVicar, RDK Foundation, Inc., Real Racine, Reliance Controls, Twin Disc, Inc.; Bronze Sponsors—Anonymous, Baird, Susan Boland, Virginia Buhler, Educators Credit Union, Fredrick and Deborah Ganaway, William A. Guenther, Tom and Sharon Harty, Andrea and Tony Hauser, The Norbell Foundation, Bill and Mary Walker; Media Sponsors—88Nine Radio Milwaukee, Wisconsin Public Radio.

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Together, the two campuses of the Racine Art Museum, RAM in downtown Racine at 441 Main Street and the Charles A. Wustum Museum of Fine Arts at 2519 Northwestern Avenue, seek to elevate the stature of contemporary crafts to that of fine art by exhibiting significant works in craft media with painting, sculpture, and photography, while providing outstanding educational art programming.

Both campuses of the Racine Art Museum are currently operating with limited hours, open Wednesday through Saturday from Noon to 4:00 pm. To comply with the City of Racine mandate, masks covering both nose and mouth are required to enter RAM and RAM's Wustum Museum at all times.