New Spirit: American Art in the Armory Show, 1913

This show marks the 100-year anniversary of the famous and controversial 1913 exhibition of modern art at the 69th Regiment Armory building in New York City. While American art constituted the majority of works in the show, it was the European art that caused a stir and has dominated discussion of the Armory Show ever since. Opening exactly one hundred years after the original show, the exhibition at the Montclair Art Museum will be the first to focus primarily on American artists represented in the show. It will enlist new scholarship to challenge the conventional notion that their art was largely provincial and will spotlight the diverse range of American art exhibited. The Montclair Art Museum is also collaborating with the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art on a gallery that will be devoted to rare and unique primary documents pertaining to the Armory Show.