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Iris Cantor Lauded by French President François Hollande

On March 20 Iris Cantor was celebrated by French President François Hollande in a ceremony where he bestowed on her the new rank of Officier in the French Legion d'Honneur. Mrs. Cantor, President and Chairman of the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Foundation, first became a member of this august organization in 2000, when she was named a Chevalier. During the past two decades she has been repeatedly cited for her profound philanthropy and support for the worlds of culture and healthcare for women in France. Before a crowd of about 100 people -- including members of the press and of Paris' museum community, well-wishers, and friends -- President Hollande told Iris Cantor that she was "right to be passionate about Rodin. He is a beautiful companion." He went on to say, "Thanks to your love for Rodin, you and your husband have contributed to the influence of France. Therefore, because...

April 21, 2017

News

International Art World Commemorates One-Hundredth Anniversary Year of Rodin’s Death

When Auguste Rodin died on November 17, 1917 he was the most famous sculptor since Michelangelo. His work was exhibited and collected world-wide and it had an enormous influence on what sculptors of his day and ours create and exhibit. Now, one hundred years after his death, museums all over the world are commemorating Rodin's vision as he transformed sculpture from a traditional artform to a modern one. The Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Foundation has been a major participant in this commemoration. As it has every year since the late 1970s, the Cantor Foundation has loaned traveling exhibitions to museums all over North America. Much sought-after, these exhibitions have visited scores of museums and have introduced Rodin to more than ten million people since the program began. Currently on tour are Rodin: The Human Experience; Selections from the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Collections and Rodin: Portraits of a Lifetime;...

April 21, 2017

News

Foundation Offering Two New Rodin Exhibitions for 2018, 2019, 2020

Two new exhibitions are now in the works. Muses, Sirens, and Lovers: Rodin and Women, Selections from the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Collections will include about 45 bronzes of Rodin’s women: as models; as objects of love, dalliance and appetite; as collectors of his work; and of course as the subject of his artistic fascination. The exhibition will include special loans of Rodins that have been donated by the Cantors and the Cantor Foundation to the Brooklyn Museum, the Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University, the North Carolina Museum of Art, and other institutional friends of the Cantors and the Foundation. The other exhibition is a general, 22-piece retrospective filled with "stars." It's called Rodin: Truth, Form, Life, Selections from the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Collections. Sized especially for college museums and galleries, it's being snatched up by academic institutions. Both shows will travel though 2020. Museums are...

April 21, 2017

News

Foundation Leadership Gets “New Portfolios”

At its April meeting, the Boad of Directors of the Cantor Foundation named Vice President of the Board of Trustees Ryan Fisher the new Executive Director of the Foundation. The fourth Executive Director in the Foundation's 41-year history, Fisher's election to the leadership position puts him directly in charge of the Foundation's philanthropic efforts and its vision for moving forward into the 21st century. Fisher's first official act was to name Judith Sobol, who had been ED for 16 years and as such oversaw the curatorial, philanthropic, and administrative functions of the Foundation, to the new position of Curator of Collections and Exhibitions. As such, Sobol will focus on the Foundation's traveling exhibitions and loan programs. Photo: Ryan Fisher and Judith Sobol chat during a visit to Rodin's exhibition pavilion at his home in Meudon, a suburb of Paris....

April 21, 2017

News

University of Richmond’s Harnett Museum Hosts RODIN: THE HUMAN EXPERIENCE

On a lovely summer evening in late August a lively crowd of students, faculty, and townspeople turned out for the public opening of Rodin: The Human Experience; Selections from the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Collections at the Joel and Lila Harnett Museum of Art at the University of Richmond. This exhibition of 32 bronzes from the Cantor Collections is on a three-year tour of American museums. The Harnett's opening celebration began with a welcome by Elizabeth Schlatter (left), deputy director and curator of exhibitions at the Museums. She shared insights gained about Rodin's sculpture from the process of installing the show, saying that "one thing I didn’t quite expect until we started laying out the exhibition was the contrast between the dark and often warm colors of the bronzes and the creamy white paint of our walls and pedestals. This contrast creates a silhouette effect and manages to bring out the strong linear quality...

October 31, 2016

News

Large Clenched Left Hand

Rodin was fascinated by the expressive capabilities of hands. He modeled hundreds of them, using them both as independent sculptures and as parts of more complex pieces. By carefully modeling their musculature, proportion, texture, and balance, he demonstrated that hands could convey profound emotion, from anger and despair to compassion and tenderness. When Rodin composed a new figure, he often experimented by attaching to it hands made for earlier pieces in order to explore the possibilities the new combinations might reveal. This working method also encouraged Rodin’s interest in the fragment and also inspired his exploration of the notion that figurative sculpture need not depend on a whole figure to communicate meaning. Large Clenched Left Hand has fascinated hand surgeons for decades. A few years ago, The Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University collaborated with a hand surgeon at Stanford’s Medical School to examine what could be diagnosed...

October 28, 2016

Spotlight

Symposium Highlights Catalyst Role of Iris Cantor-UCLA Women’s Health Center

[caption id="attachment_2410" align="alignleft" width="300"] Photo includes (standing) panel moderator Dr. Andrea Hevener, Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of Endocrinology & Diabetes, UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine; second from right is Gail Greendale, MD, Professor of Medicine and Obstetrics and Gynecology and Research Director for the Iris Cantor-UCLA Women’s Health Center.[/caption] The Iris Cantor-UCLA Women’s Health Center sponsored a “Catalyst” symposium on women’s health research this past spring. It was attended by 80 UCLA scientists and included panel presentations on current research and a poster session where 20 researchers described their current research projects and findings.To further their work, three poster presenters were each awarded $2,000 by the Director’s Fund of the Center. A medical student and public health student were also recognized for their work. “We were thrilled to receive support from the UCLA Clinical and Translational Science Institute, funded by the National Institutes of Health, for this first of its kind...

October 28, 2016

News

The Fallen Caryatids

In the early 1880s Rodin created two female figures, each in a spiral pose, each either falling in within herself due to the heavy load she bears (one totes an huge stone on her shoulder, the other has an equally-sizable urn) or each springing into action despite her burden. These figures are descendants of Greek caryatids, architectural columns in the guise of female figures who bear the weight of a building's architrave on their heads. We thank North Carolina Museum of Art Curator David Steel for reminding us in his beautiful volume about Cantor gifts to his Museum that these two works speak not only to Rodin's times but also to ours. Steel quotes this passage in Robert Heinlein's 1961 novel Stranger in a Strange Land: There Jubal Harshaw, the “neo-pessimist philosopher,” waxes eloquently about Rodin's sculpture: “This poor little caryatid has fallen under the load. She's a good girl -- look at...

August 17, 2016

Spotlight

American Ambassador and American Hospital of Paris Honor Iris Cantor for Her Contributions to Healthcare for Women

[caption id="attachment_2278" align="aligncenter" width="600"] Top block of photos:top: Karin Charnoff-Katz, M.D.; Bernadette Toomey; Sharon Jacquet; Iris Cantor; Anne Moore, M.D.; Sam Selesnick, M.D.; Alexander Swistel, M.D.bottom left: Iris Cantor and Honorable Jane D. Hartley, U.S. Ambassador to France.bottom center: Susan Mascitelli, Iris Cantor, Ryan Fisherbottom right: Honorable Howard H. Leach, former U.S. Ambassador to France.[/caption] Iris Cantor, Founder and President of the Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Foundation, is recognized around the world for essentially redefining clinical health care for women — the result of her determination to move the medical establishment toward compassionate healthcare customized to each gender. This past June Iris visited Paris as guest of honor of American Ambassador Jane Hartley, the American Embassy, and the American Hospital of Paris. She was honored for her years of dedication to women's health around the world. Most importantly, her visit commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Iris and B. Gerald...

August 17, 2016

News

Rodin: Portraits of a Lifetime, Selections from the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Collections now on view at Cedar Rapids Museum of Art in Iowa

Residents and summer visitors to Cedar Rapids have the opportunity to see the Foundation's circulating exhibition, Rodin: Portraits of a Lifetime, now on view at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art until September 11. Part of a museum-wide celebration of portraiture, the exhibition's stop in Cedar Rapids is part of its three-year nation-wide tour. “The Rodin exhibition offers people a rare opportunity to see work by the most important sculptor since Michelangelo," said Sean Ulmer, the Museum's Executive Director. "Rodin redefined sculpture and ushered in the modern era. In many ways, he did for sculpture what the Impressionists did for painting.” Commenting on the long-term friendship between the Cantor Foundation and the Museum, Foundation Executive Director and Curator Judith Sobol noted that the Museum hosted a large Cantor Rodin respective in 1991 and has also been a "favorite place for loans. We are delighted that the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art continues to...

August 16, 2016

News

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