Pop art

The Museum of Fine Arts in Bern has devoted an important exhibition to Swiss artist Rolf Iseli, presenting paintings, objects, sculptures and prints that survey the artist's 50 years of work. Arranged in thematic groups the works show the explosive energy of an outstanding artistic life -Iseli's main subject is man and his natural environment.

There must have existed some moment, all but forgotten now, when the expression "contemporary art" was still capable of alluding to a particular historical reality in the art world. That reality would have provided a sufficiently natural link of continuity between the ancient and modern historical - artistic account with a new chapter. But today we know - and above all feel - that contemporary art (and the idea of the "contemporary" in general) can no longer be just another episode in the wider story, despite the fact that museums and historians find their raison d'être in this "narrative inertia".

THE BALTIMORE MUSEUM OF ART (BMA) WAS THE FINAL VENUE OF THE FOUR-MUSEUM TOUR TO PRESENT THE FIRST U.S. MUSEUM EXHIBITION EXPLORING THE LATE WORKS OF THE ICONIC AMERICAN ARTIST ANDY WARHOL (1928-1987). ON VIEW THERE FROM OCTOBER 2010 THROUGH JANUARY 2011, MORE THAN 50 WORKS REVEALED THE POP ARTIST'S ENERGETIC RETURN TO PAINTING AND RENEWED SPIRIT OF EXPERIMENTATION DURING THE LAST DECADE OF HIS LIFE. THIS PERIOD SHOWS WARHOL IN THE MIDST OF HIS CELEBRITY CREATING MORE PAINTINGS AND ON A VASTLY LARGER SCALE THAN AT ANY OTHER MOMENT OF HIS 40-YEAR CAREER. EXHIBITION HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE PSYCHOLOGICALLY REVEALING FRIGHT WIG SELF-PORTRAITS, THREE VARIATIONS ON LEONARDO DA VINCI'S THE LAST SUPPER, AND COLLABORATIONS WITH YOUNGER ARTISTS SUCH AS JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT. SEVERAL OF THESE WORKS - ASSEMBLED FROM NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC AND PRIVATE COLLECTIONS, AS WELL AS THE BMA'S EXCEPTIONAL COLLECTION OF LATE WORKS BY WARHOL -WERE NOT EXHIBITED UNTIL AFTER THE ARTIST'S DEATH.