Under New York Skies: Nocturnes by Yvonne Jacquette

For 30 years, Yvonne Jacquette (b. 1934) has made night paintings from aerial vantage points of such cities as San Francisco, Chicago, Washington, Hong Kong, and Tokyo—along with bird’s-eye views of Maine and Midwestern farmland—but her images of New York City are without question the most celebrated. Under New York Skies: Nocturnes by Yvonne Jacquette presents 30 paintings and pastels of the city’s splendid architecture, neon signage, bridges, streets, and waterways. The dramatic and glittering canvases are striking for their bold compositions and the powerful presence of their grand scale, while the surface richness and freer handling of the pastel studies give the viewer a more intimate look at the metropolitan scene.

Concurrently, the Museum also presents Street Dance: The New York Photographs of Rudy Burckhardt, exploring the work of Jacquette’s late husband, the photographer, filmmaker, and painter Rudy Burckhardt (1914–1999). The two exhibitions offer the first-ever opportunity to examine together the work of this celebrated artistic partnership. The publication Picturing New York: The Art of Yvonne Jacquette and Rudy Burckhardt accompanies the exhibitions and looks at the place the couple held in the New York art world from the late 1930s to the present. Co-published by Bunker Hill, the book features essays by Andrea Henderson Fahnestock and Vincent Katz and an introduction by Bill Berkson.

Lead funding for the exhibitions and publication comes from the Robert Lehman Foundation and The Kaplen Foundation. Additional support has been provided by The Judith Rothschild Foundation and Richard and Ronay Menschel.