The UBS Art Gallery

HEYDAY is arranged to chronologically illustrate the event of the circus coming to town. Lithographic promotional posters would vividly announce upcoming performances, with hyperbolic claims about the spectacular events soon to unfold. Examples of these posters are juxtaposed with Glasier’s photographs that document the arrival of the circus, from the excitement of parades that take over small towns, to the set-up of the massive big top tent, which could hold more than 12,000 people.

Highlights on view include photographs of circus performers captured in the midst of their acts, such as the Deike Sisters, a gymnastic family with the Barnum & Bailey circus. The exhibition features both a photograph (c. 1910) and a 1909 promotional poster that illustrate the Deike Sisters’ “contortional cleverness and muscular control in artistic bending.” Glasier also captured a split-second moment in a trapeze aerial act by the Flying Banvards in the photograph Maude Banvard, The Catch, Brockton Fair (1907).

Glasier’s great strength was as a portraitist, and his photographs reveal an intimate connection with the circus and sideshow performers. A 1914 portrait of Chief Iron Tail, a star of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, captured the strength and dignity of the last survivor of the Battles of Little Big Horn and Wounded Knee. His photograph of Mademoiselle Octavia (c. 1901), known as the “Yankee Snake Charmer,” has a sensual aspect as snakes writhe over Octavia’s form-fitting, sleeveless outfit. Charmion, Strong Woman (1904) is a bold image of a partially disrobed circus star whose muscular poses challenge ideas of feminine beauty and physical strength. Pete Mardo (1923) is a portrait of Peter Guckeyson, who ran away from home and joined the circus to become a traditional white-faced clown under the name Pete Mardo.

Mademoiselle Octavia, Snake Charmer, circa 1901

Pete Mardo, 1923

Maude Banvard, The Catch, Brockton Fair, 1907

Deike Sisters, circa 1910

Clowns, circa 1905

Charmion, Strong Woman, 1904

The purpose of the Eakins Press Foundation is the advancement of literature and art through excellence of presentation to a broad public. The Foundation’s program supports and encourages the craftsmanship and art of authors, artists, painters and photographers, both unknown and of established reputation, whose efforts are non-commercial or commercially unfeasible. The Foundation issues works of the past and present that forward or are relevant to the vision, integrity and teaching of Thomas Eakins, the American painter for whom the Foundation is named. Publications and exhibitions include little-known or neglected masterpieces of the American past having contemporary pertinence, and classic and contemporary works that would otherwise not be published or presented with the quality the work deserves. For more information, please visit www.eakinspress.com.

UBS has a longstanding and ongoing commitment to the support of the arts and culture. UBS sponsors four exhibitions each year in The UBS Art Gallery, located in the lobby of its building at 1285 Avenue of the Americas, New York City. Through its exhibition program, the Gallery offers non-profit arts and cultural organizations a midtown Manhattan exhibition space and the opportunity to introduce their programs to a new audience. The UBS Art Gallery enables many institutions to organize and mount exhibitions that might not otherwise be seen. These exhibitions encourage interest in the arts among the hundreds of employees, clients and members of the general public who pass through the UBS building each day.

UBS also has its own art collection. Recognized internationally as one of the most important corporate collections of contemporary art, The UBS Art Collection comprises more than 1000 paintings, photographs, drawings and sculptures and video by many of the world’s leading artists from 1950 to the present. UBS is proud of this heritage of collecting and embraces the Collection as a treasure to be shared with our employees, clients, shareholders and other individuals passionate about art through international loans and tours of selected works. To further share our Collection with the public, UBS provides permanent online access to works in the Collection, information on the artists and online exhibitions via an interactive web museum at www.ubs.com/artcollection.

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Milton Avery, Paintings from the Collection of the Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase College, State University of New York
Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase College, State University of New York
February 5, 2009 – May 1, 2009

Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University
Organized by the National Association of Women Artists
May 14 – July 31, 2009

The UBS Art Gallery is located in the UBS Building at 1285 Avenue of the Americas (between 51st and 52nd Streets) in New York City. The Gallery is on the ground floor of the building and exhibition hours are Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. until 6:00 p.m. Admission is free.

**For recorded exhibition information: (212) 713-2885**