Vintage Dallas, Texas postcard, circa 1940. From gettyimages.com.
Back in 2014 on our Freakin’ ‘Tiquen trip in Texas, we made sure to visit the Dallas Museum of Art. First we started our day at Fair Park, to see the largest collection of intact 1930’s World’s Fair buildings. Being July in Texas it was hot. With the temperature hitting 103 degrees Fahrenheit (39.4 Celsius), the Dallas Museum of Art provided a perfect spot to cool off. And to our surprise there were many great Art Deco objects on display.
The Dallas Museum of Art. Image from facebook.com/DallasMuseumofArt
The origins of the Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) date back to the beginning of the 20th Century. In 1903 the Dallas Art Association began exhibiting works of art at The Dallas Public Library. Their collection grew rapidly during the next few decades and in 1932 was renamed the Dallas Museum of Fine Art. Needing a much larger space, the museum moved to a building at Fair Park during the Centennial Exposition in 1936. The 1963 merger of the Dallas Museum of Fine Art with Dallas Museum of Contemporary Art greatly increased the size of the collection. It was soon realized that the combined collections needed a larger home. Fund raising commenced in 1979 and the new building opened to the public in January, 1984.
Today the museum houses more than 24,000 works of art from around the world dating from the ancient to the contemporary. This includes more than 8,000 pieces of design and decorative arts. Reuben Haley, Norman Bel Geddes and Walter Dorwin Teague are some of the interwar period designers whose works are in the DMA collection.
At present the DMA is open to the public, but for many, traveling is still not a viable option. Luckily the museum does provide online access to its collection. The navigation of the site is a little tricky, so here are a few keywords to help you find some great Art Deco pieces.
Here is the Dallas Museum of Art homepage. This is where the virtual visit begins.
To start your visit, go to the DMA home page. From the banner menu choose “Art”, this will open a drop down menu. In the drop down menu click on “Collection’.
This is the start of your DMA virtual visit.
Clicking on “Collection” will bring you to this window.
Your “visit” begins by clicking on the “Search the Collection” box at the bottom of the screen.
After clicking on “SEARCH THE COLLECTION” you will be brought to the page where a search term can be entered.
The “Type your search” window.
On my first virtual visit I used the term “Art Deco”.
Type in “Art Deco”.
Hit enter after typing in “Art Deco”.
The results from using the term “Art Deco”.
It surprised me that using the term “Art Deco” only brought up 33 results. To be sure some nice collection items came up. But some of the results weren’t items but windows saying “TIME & PLACES French Art Deco”. Choosing this will give you a great and succinct description of French Art Deco.
DMA description of French Art Deco.
Choosing a photograph of an item and clicking on it will bring you to the a very detailed page describing the piece with multiple photos. Here is the page about a very wonderful Daum Frères glass vase from the late 1920s.
Item details of a Daum Frères vase in the DMA collection.
Scrolling down brings you to a general description of the Daum Frères company and the vase.
General description of the Daum Frères company on the page for the vase.
To find more Art Deco items a better search term to use is “modernism”.
Using the search term “Modernism”.
“Modernism” brings up 777 results. And any item in the Dallas Museum of Art’s collection that is tagged with the term will come up, including paintings, ceramics, glassware, etc. These pieces are not exclusive to the interwar period but it is easy to scroll down the page to find some iconic Art Deco objects.
Search results using the word “modernism”.
Here is a 1925 Square Modern Fulper Pottery teapot designed by Reuben Haley who is probably best known for creating Ruba Rombic a few years later.
Reuben Haley’s Square Modern teapot for Fulper Pottery, 1925.
The Dallas Museum of Art is also home to some great modern paintings. Here is Razor by Gerald Murphy from 1924. Depicting objects for the 1920s man, a box of matches, fountain pen and safety razor, this painting is a prototype of the pop art movement of the 1940s.
Razor, 1924 by Gerald Murphy.
Another way to search is by artist / designer. Having visited the museum back in 2013, I know they have pieces by Walter Dorwin Teague. Here is the result by searching with Teague’s name.
Search results for Walter Dorwin Teague.
The details of Teague’s 1935 Sparton Model 566 “Bluebird” radio.
These are only a few of the many great items in the DMA collection. So until you can get there safely, take a virtual tour. Plus you will also get to “see” a lot of items that are not currently on view. Just one last piece of advice, I do find “visiting” on my laptop is easier to navigate that on my smart phone.
Anthony & Chris (The Freakin’, ‘Tiquen Guys)
