ROMANCE
Things to Come: OUTLINES, 1941–1947
co-curated by Brittany ReillyMarch 20–August 29, 2026
i.
Meshes and Designs
Anni Albers, Alexander Calder, Julio De Diego,Maya Deren, Gertrude Glass Greene, Sam Kramer,
Paul Mayén, Peter Müller-Munk Isamu Noguchi,
Jens Risom, Arthur “Art” Smith, Eva Zeisel
Outlines championed European modernists not yet widely known in the United States, and American artists remarkably early in their path, including those driving creative inquiry in Pittsburgh where many of the artists immersed themselves. Outlines held exhibitions of early sculptures and jewelry by Alexander Calder, Joseph Cornell’s rarely seen Forgotten Games box constructions, film experiments by Maya Deren, and performances by John Cage and Merce Cunningham, among many others. Several of these artists engaged chance operations and “non-art” vernacular, which constituted a distinctive facet of the gallery’s program. Congruent with the Bauhaus ethos and involving its players, Outlines also blurred dimensions between creative disciplines—architecture, industrial and furniture design, functional objects, hand-craft and the graphic and advertising arts. In this environment, industrial designer-artists László Moholy-Nagy and Robert Lepper exhibited and lectured; projects by Gropius and Wright, among other architectural concepts, prompted discussion; and innovative techniques by Anni Albers were showcased.
An installation in the adjacent gallery, on view through April 26, brings together objects by designers involved with Outlines including Jens Risom, Isamu Noguchi, Peter Muller-Munk, and Eva Zeisel. Staged as a period room of the imagination through dialogue with Maya Deren’s Meshes of the Afternoon(1943)—and interwoven with outtakes featuring both artist and gallerist—the film’s flickering presence evokes a psychic architecture. While probing modernism’s implicit, very real limits, this presentation also celebrates these works and designs, Outlines’ rigorous experimentation, and female-led endeavor.
