Waterhouse & Dodd Launches a New Madison Avenue Space with Impressionist and Modern Masters
Changes are afoot at Waterhouse & Dodd, the London- and New York-based art dealers that have been in business since 1870. After growing out of the original gallery on Bond Street and opening a new exhibition space in Mayfair last year, history is repeating itself on this side of the pond, with the New York gallery now moving into a larger venue. It is just one door down on Madison Avenue, but the new gallery has an impressive 22 feet of windows, not to mention a new art director, Stefany Sekara Morris, a former senior specialist in the Impressionist and Modern Art department at Christie’s.
The inaugural show at 960 Madison Avenue is a reflection of Morris’ expertise and Waterhouse & Dodd’s continuing focus on heavy-hitting European and American artists from impressionist, modern, and contemporary periods. Featured impressionist works include Renoir’s Paysage du Midi avec vue sur la mer (1905)and Loiseau’s Bords de l'Eure (1920), alongside both the eerie Figure at the Window (1892) by Édouard Vuillardand a pair of Picasso works, notably Deux baigneuses, a delicate ink painting from 1923. But generally speaking,the inaugural exhibition is heavier on modern and contemporary art: there’s Basquiat’s Free Comb (1986), Damien Hirst’s Elaidic Anhydride (2007), and Cindy Sherman’s Madame de Pompadour née Poisson (1721-1764), a silk-screened and handpainted porcelain work from 1990. A few lesser-known artists add interest, especially the stark black-and-white portrayals of natural landscapes—from Xavier Guardans’ stark pigment print Hidden Valley No 8, California (2011) to Karen Gunderson’s oil-on-linen work, the haunting Waves Off Wellfleet (2013).
All told, the inaugural show offers an impressively diverse range of works, and the airy new second-story gallery is a suitably sleek and light-filled space in which to display them. Co-founder Ray Waterhouse echoed the sentiment when he spoke to a reporter in late August: “I’ve been searching for the right space since I moved to New York three years ago and delighted we now have a gallery here to equal the one in London.”
—Bridget Gleeson
Waterhouse & Dodd's inaugural show at 960 Madison Avenue is on view in New York, Nov. 4–Dec. 19, 2014.
