Beauty industry pioneer and self-made magnate Helena Rubinstein (1872-1965) popularized cosmetics throughout the female workforce during World War I, empowering women of all ages and backgrounds to express their individuality. Her salons, located on four continents, are infused with eclectic, feminine aesthetics and decorated with furnishings and artworks from wide-ranging periods and origins. Helena Rubinstein: Beauty Is Power, at the Boca Raton Museum of Art through July 12, reunites modern paintings, figurative sculptures and her collection of tribal masks with dramatic jewelry and stately couture Rubinstein wore in her many portraits. The first exhibition dedicated to this iconic entrepreneur draws compelling connections between art, life and the business of beauty.
Rubinstein holding a mask from the Ivory Coast, 1934; Bradford Robotham; Bradford Robotham; George Maillard Kesslere/SUNY
Since capturing the art world’s attention in 1976 with poignant photographs of female figurines isolated in miniature 1950s-style domestic interiors, Laurie Simmons has staged dolls of myriad makes and models in unsettling scenarios with psychosocial overtones. The molded monochrome “Teenettes” who toured landmarks via projected postcard vistas in 1984 gave way to more personal surrogates like the ventriloquist dummy cast in Simmons’ own image 10 years later, and the maternal character she inspired and played in daughter Lena Dunham’s 2010 feature film Tiny Furniture (precursor to the HBO hit series Girls). Laurie Simmons: How We See takes cues from an online community of self-styled “Doll Girls” for six larger-than-life headshots, on display at the Jewish Museum in New York City until August 9.
How We See/Edie; ©Laurie Simmons/Salon 94
The golden anniversary of The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum was more than an occasion to reflect on its founder, fashion designer Larry Aldrich (1906-2001). It also provided an opportunity to put into perspective the relationship between our cultural present and groundbreaking experimentation of the 1960s and ’70s. Now The Aldrich is excavating the very creation and presentation of art in Circumstance (through Oct. 25), which carves the museum’s 2004 addition (itself a reinterpretation of traditional New England architecture) into six individual spheres of influence. The artists commissioned to contextualize new works include five women spanning ages 36 to 69—Virginia Poundstone, Nancy Shaver, Ruby Sky Stiler, Penelope Umbrico, Elif Uras and B. Wurtz. While their objects of inspiration are as refined as ancient Greek vases, modernist designs and Depression-era photographs, some also source materials in thrift stores, supermarkets and plant nurseries.
The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum; Peter Aaron/Esto
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