Landmark Exhibition Reassembles Jewel City Works

“The overwhelming message of the Panama-Pacific International Exhibition, mounted a veritable instant after the tragedy of the 1906 earthquake and fire, is one of an optimistic, au­dacious San Francisco, not unlike the city of to­day…San Francisco’s Jewel City was the realiza­tion of the common dream of many individuals, a goal achieved.”—Historian Laura A. Ackle

The year 2015 marks the centennial of the Pan­ama-Pacific International Exposition (PPIE), the San Francisco world’s fair that celebrated the opening of the Panama Canal and the city’s reconstruction following the great earthquake of 1906.

The grand exposition covered 76 city blocks and boasted national and international pavil­ions showcasing innovation, industry, and the arts. At the heart of the PPIE was one of the most ambitious art exhibitions ever presented in the United States, encompassing more than 11,000 paintings, sculptures, prints, and pho­tographs, in addition to a significant array of public murals and monuments.

To mark this anniversary, the exhibit Jewel City, opening at the de Young in San Francisco on October 17, revisits this vital moment in the in­auguration of San Francisco as the West Coast’s cultural epicenter. The landmark exhibition re­assembles more than 200 works by major Amer­ican and European artists, most of which were on display at this defining event.

Jewel City shares examples that signal the key artistic trends of 1915, from the conservative to the avant-garde: American and French Im­pressionism; works by members of the Ashcan School; paintings from the emerging modernist styles in Italy, Hungary, Austria, Finland, and Norway; and more.

Highlights include an impressive survey of American art, with works by Mary Cassatt, Thomas Eakins, John Singer Sargent, James McNeill Whistler, Winslow Homer, Frederic Remington, John Sloan, Robert Henri, and other masters. In addition, the presentation boasts an extensive offering of European paint­ing and sculpture, with examples on view by such greats as Gustave Courbet, James Tis­sot, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, Auguste Rodin, Théo van Rysselberghe, and Edvard Munch. Monumental murals designed for the fair, including those by Arthur F. Mathews and William de Leftwich Dodge, will be seen for the first time in nearly a century.

For more information about the exhibit, please visit: https://deyoung.famsf.org/exhibitions/jewel-city-art-panama-pacific-international-exposition?utm_source=Fine+Arts+Museums+of+San+Francisco+E-Mail+List&utm_campaign=bd2a839b2b-7_22_general_e_news&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_9757c5111b-bd2a839b2b-85418097

To learn more about the City’s full PPIE pro­gram, go to: http://www.ppie100.org/