Villa America: American Moderns, 1900 – 1950

Sure, it wasn’t until the 1950s that New York finally wrested the “art capital of the world” title away from Paris. But it’s not as if Jackson Pollock et al didn’t have help from their predecessors, especially before the Depression. That’s when innovators like Georgia O’Keeffe, Arthur Dove, Stuart Davis, Marsden Hartley, Gerald Murphy, and Morgan Russell laid the groundwork for that eventual transfer of power, not just by hanging out in New York, but also by consorting with artists throughout Europe. In fact, this exhibition, whose works come from the private collection of Myron Kunin, takes its name from Murphy’s 1924 painting and his home in southern France, where he hosted a number of fellow Yankees. The exhibit also includes works from the thirties and forties by relative homebodies like Paul Cadmus, Grant Wood, Reginald Marsh, Andrew Wyeth, Philip Guston, Romare Bearden, and Charles Sheeler, and a section of portraits, one of the strongest parts of the Kunin collection. 612-870-3131; www.artsmia.org