The International Exhibition of Modern Art, popularly titled the Armory Show, was an enormous art exhibition held in New York City, from February 17 to March 15, 1913. The exhibition, housed in the New York Guards Sixty-ninth Regiment Armory, consisted of an estimated 1,600 works of art. The show was a critical turning point for art, exposing the American public to early modernist art and providing an opportunity for modern works to be purchased by collectors. The Armory Show made an impression on the public and initiated many American collectors, whose support was essential, to modern art. Many of their acquisitions were built out of the Armory Show and became part of many major art museum collections.
The idea for the show itself came from a group of American artists who were frustrated with the restricted exhibitions of the National Academy of Design. They wanted to establish a more open market for exhibitions and create more patronage opportunities. What the Armory Show revealed was the division in American taste. Conservatives disapproved of the show, claiming it as un-American. They associated it with the anxiety many Americans felt at the rapid change of their society under the pressure of immigration.
The Armory Show consisted of American and European-themed sections, exhibiting various mediums of painting, decorative arts, sculpture, watercolors, prints, and drawings. Gallery space was divided into 18 rooms, with the American rooms assigned to the large entry hall and additional rooms flanking each side of the building American artists included John Marin, Childe Hassam, J. Alden Weir, Margaret Hoard, and Edith Dimock. European sections were primarily housed in the central area of the gallery, showing works by Francisco de Goya, Ferdinand Delacroix, Gustave Courbet, the Impressionists, and leading contemporary artists such as Marcel Duchamp and Vassily Kandinsky. It was the European section that generated the most public interest and became the focus of controversy. There was a good deal of criticism and ridicule, particularly directed at Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase, but there were also many positive reviews.
In the spring of 1913, the show traveled from New York to Chicago and Boston, creating an enormous impact. It was estimated that over a quarter of a million visitors paid to see it. The Armory Show created a climate more favorable to experimentation and had a profound effect on many young American artists. Important patrons and collectors such as Louise Arensberg, Arthur J. Eddy, and Lillie P. Bliss made their first purchases of modern art from that exhibited at the Armory Show.
The Armory Show was a major event in American art history. It had a tremendous impact on artists, collectors, and the art market. The show balanced American and European standards of reference in progressive art, shaking the rigid structure of the art market. There was an increase in museum attendance, and more art books were published and purchased. Modern art was now publicly accepted with more confidence.
See also art; Ashcan school; modernism.
Further reading: Milton W Brown, The Story of the Armory Show (New York: Abbeville Press, 1988); Abraham a. Davidson, Early American Modernist Painting, 1910-1935 (New York: Harper & Row, 1981).
—Marcia M. Farah
Elih-u Root, 2 vols.
World History
