Art collector Peggy Guggenheim was born in 1898.

Niece of Solomon Guggenheim, after whom New York’s famous Guggenheim Museum is named, Peggy Guggenheim was an art collector and patron in her own right. Born in New York, she lived a radical bohemian lifestyle in Paris following World War I. She eventually married painter Max Ernst and opened a modern art gallery, Guggenheim Jeune, in London. In the months before World War II began in Europe, Guggenheim escalated her purchases of artworks, buying about one new piece per day, and amassed one of the most important private collections of modern art. Guggenheim escaped Europe with her artworks and returned to New York, where she opened a new gallery, Art of This Century, in which she featured surrealist and abstract art. An important space for contemporary art, Art of This Century hosted early exhibits of a number of artists, including Pollock and Rothko. In 1946 she moved permanently to Venice and established a gallery in her villa there. Today, the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, still housed in that villa, is Italy’s most important museum for early 20th century American and European art. Although small, the villa, Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, is filled with art by the leading names in early and mid-20^th century art, such as Pollock, Picasso and Calder. These works reflect Peggy Guggenheim’s preference for modern abstract, cubist and surrealist works. Today, both her collection and the villa in Venice are part of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation.

ARTSEDGE
ARTSEDGE’s curriculum unit Rhythm and Art (9–12) includes lessons on Painting (9–12) and The Elements of Art (9–12) which help students understand the medium that so enthralled Peggy Guggenheim.

In The Art Collector (9–12), students select works of art for an imaginary personal collection and justify the selection of each piece based not only on their personal aesthetics but also on the historical importance of each artist.

In Art Show with the Masters! (5–8), students research artists, create original works of art based on their understanding of the artists and then create an art show for their copies of these artists’ paintings or sculptures.

Xpeditions
Works of art, particularly paintings, can reveal a good deal of information about places and how they looked in the past. In Geography and History in Songs (9–12), students look at historical paintings on the Internet and describe what the paintings reveal about the places depicted therein.

EconEdLink
In Marketplace: To Show or Not to Show (9–12), students look at the economic decision-making of both art owners and the museums that want to display borrowed works. They then play the role of museum or gallery owner and decide which works to exhibit.

EDSITEment
Realistic Impressions: Investigating Movements in the Visual Arts (9–12) helps students to understand the idea of movements in the visual arts and to begin to differentiate between some of the most well known movements in Western art—particularly in painting.