I had the pleasure one afternoon of visiting the Tucson Museum of Art. It was my first time visiting and the museum was impressive for what I thought was an extremely small building to be an art museum. The main exhibit was a collection of paintings and drawings by an artist named Bob Kuhn. The collection is of his works from his early days until later on when he was more established. Most of his works focus on wildlife and the many poses of animal anatomy.
The layout of the museum is interesting. It is located in the historic buildings of downtown so there are multiple galleries as part of the museum. The main building has an entryway and then has a spiraling walkway down to floors that are located underground. The Bob Kuhn exhibit is located at the initial entryway and covers the first two to three levels. The art is hung along the walls and there were two separate instances where they incorporated digital media. One was a video of Bob Kuhn completing a painting. Another was a digital slideshow of some of his sketches or paintings and you could touch the screen to enlarge, or get more details, of that particular image. The walls were dominantly white but there were some accent walls of a very bright blue, like a pure sky on a beautiful day.
Some of the first images I encountered were sketches of animals, rabbits, wolves, and bears. Then beside the sketchings are finished paintings. According to the brochure he originally worked in a zoo so his subjects are very typical North American animals. At some point in his life, and proven by his paintings, he went to Kenya. On the second level the images become leopards, elephants, giraffes, and lions. I loved the inclusion of the sketches and doodles because I could see the skeleton or framework of the finished image. On one of the little placards the artist explained that he would constantly be drawing or doodling and once a certain shape caught his attention he would add the detail and keep working until there was a finished painting. The sketchings were on napkins and hotel stationary. You can just imagine this guy scribbling away all the time.
The content of his works were extremely realistic. The poses of all the animals were so anatomically correct. Some are animals in stationary poses like sleeping or sitting. Some are animals in motion like hunting chases or play. The muscle definition in the sketches is so defined. Once the sketch is a painting the fur of the animal can cover some of the skeleton or muscle but even the fur is the perfect color and shading. One particular painting of a bear was so realistic it seemed that you could pet the bear and your hand could sink into its thick fur. There were duplicates of images because someone would commission him to enlarge a painting for their personal use. Bob Kuhn’s images were also used on book covers and wildlife magazine covers.
The overall experience was really pleasant. They had a few other displays that were excellent. I would recommend a visit to the Tucson Museum of Art for all ages and at any time.
Cristal Cassel 