News & Community

For immediate release – October 2, 2019

Saskatoon, Canada — The first-ever Canadian exhibition of The Sonnabend Collection, a remarkable collection that features iconic works by artists including Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and Jeff Koons opens on October 5 at Remai Modern. Opening weekend is accompanied with a full slate of performances, talks and tours that celebrate the arrival of the museum’s largest exhibition to date.

“Hosting The Sonnabend Collection, an exhibition of extraordinary scale and scope, at Remai Modern offers an incredible opportunity for visitors of all ages and interests. The works assembled in this exhibition offer the chance to experience art history as it unfolded, tracing important movements and moments in art history,” said Lynn McMaster, Remai Modern’s Interim Executive Director & CEO. “With so much excellent programming designed around The Sonnabend Collection, there are countless reasons to visit the museum again and again.”

Remai Modern members get in free to most events, including a members’ preview on October 4. They also receive a discount for ticketed events, including two performances by avant-garde dancer, choreographer and filmmaker Yvonne Rainer. Now in her 80s, Rainer continues to provoke and surprise. Continuous Project: Sixty Years was created this autumn, specifically for Remai Modern and marks her first performances in Saskatchewan. It is a work in which — as the title suggests — Rainer has disinterred and re-combined ideas from a long life in the field of dance.

Scheduled as a parallel program to The Sonnabend Collection, Rainer’s work often intersected with the works of artists on view in the exhibition. This is a rare opportunity to see one of the most important artists working in dance of the past half-century.

The Sonnabend Collection at Remai Modern features more than 100 works by 67 artists, giving viewers the opportunity to explore seven decades of artistic development through a wide variety of mediums, including painting, sculpture, performance and, photography. From Pop to Minimalism to Neo-Geo, the exhibition offers insight not only into how artists were inspired by one another, but how they often broke the conventions of the styles and movements that came before them.

Remai Modern’s exhibition is curated by Antonio Homem, who worked alongside Ileana starting in 1968, and is now Director of The Sonnabend Collection Foundation. The Sonnabend Collection is a personal journey of extraordinary encounters with some of the most iconic artists of the 20th and 21st centuries.

The exhibition is accompanied by a comprehensive catalogue, which is available at Remai Modern’s Art & Design Store and remaimodern.org. Visitors can also learn more about the exhibition at visitsonnabend.ca.

The Sonnabend Collection at Remai Modern will open on October 5, 2019 and run until March 22, 2020. The exhibition is curated by Homem and organized by Remai Modern in partnership with the Sonnabend Collection Foundation.

The Sonnabend Collection opening weekend schedule

October 4 – Exhibition preview for Remai Modern members, 7-10 PM

October 5 – The Sonnabend Collection opens to the public, 10 AM

• 10 AM-5 PM ARTMAKING: RBC Creative Space, drop-in art studio for all ages tailored to The Sonnabend Collection

• 11 AM TOUR: The Sonnabend Collection public tour

• 1 PM TOUR: Remai Modern public tour (includes The Sonnabend Collection)

• 2 PM TALK: Antonio Homem, curator of the exhibition and Director of The Sonnabend Collection Foundation. Hosted by Rose Bouthillier, Curator (Exhibitions) at Remai Modern.

• 7 PM PERFORMANCE: Yvonne Rainer, Continuous Project: Sixty Years. Tickets $25 members/$37 non-members. Available at remaimodern.org

October 6

• 1-4 PM ARTMAKING: Scotiabank Something on Sundays. Free to the public.

• 1 PM TOUR: Remai Modern public tour (includes The Sonnabend Collection)

• 2 PM TOUR: Blue Cross Family Public Tour, activities and discussions about exhibition highlights, tailored to appeal to young participants (includes The Sonnabend Collection)

• 2 PM PERFORMANCE: Yvonne Rainer, Continuous Project: Sixty Years (followed by conversation). Tickets $25 members/$37 non-members. Available at remaimodern.org

Visit remaimodern.org for a full schedule of Remai Modern events or visitsonnabend.ca for all events related to The Sonnabend Collection.

About The Sonnabend Collection

Developed through the vision of influential art dealer Ileana Sonnabend (1914-2007), her husband Michael Sonnabend (1900-2001), and their adopted son Antonio Homem, the Collection is among the most significant private holdings of modern and contemporary art in the world.

Through their galleries in Paris and New York, the Sonnabends established an international presence and fostered creative exchanges and new audiences for American artists in Europe and vice versa. Often, they championed artists early in their careers. They anticipated and influenced developments in art including Pop, Minimalism, Conceptualism, Nouveau Réalisme Arte Povera, Neo-Expressionism, Neo-Geo, Photo Conceptualism and beyond.

About Remai Modern

Remai Modern is situated on Treaty 6 Territory and the Traditional Homeland of the Métis. We pay our respects to First Nations and Métis ancestors and reaffirm our relationship with one another.

Remai Modern is a new museum of modern and contemporary art in Saskatoon. The museum is committed to affirming the powerful role that art and artists play in questioning, interpreting and defining the modern era.

Open since October 2017, Remai Modern is the largest contemporary art museum in western Canada and houses a collection of more than 8,000 works, including the world’s foremost collection of Picasso linocut prints.

Remai Modern would like to acknowledge the contributions of the Frank & Ellen Remai Foundation, the Canada Council for the Arts, SaskCulture through the Sask Lotteries Fund, the Saskatchewan Arts Board and the City of Saskatoon.

For additional information contact:

Stephanie McKay, Communications Manager

306.975.2242

smckay@remaimodern.org