The Watertown Weekly News Broadcast recently featured our new contemporary art exhibition and interviewed collector Joan Agajanian Quinn of Los Angeles. Joan explained that the “On the Edge” exhibition was proposed by the Museum’s President Michele Kolligian. The idea was to bring the community together, to enjoy the artists that contributed to the collection, and to educate the public. “This show has something for everyone,” explains Executive Director Jason Sohigian. “The collection is diverse, it is large, and it is exciting for Watertown.”
The exhibition of 125 contemporary works by artists including John Altoon, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Charles Garabedian, Frank Gehry, and David Hockney runs through Nov. 30.
WBZ’s Jordan Rich Covers ‘On the Edge’ Exhibit
"The critics are raving about On the Edge, an art exhibit featuring Los Angeles art from the 70's through the 90's," says WBZ's Jordan Rich. Jordan has been a staple in the Boston broadcasting industry as the host of WBZ AM 1030 Radio's The Jordan Rich Show. Listen here to the "New England Weekend" program with Jordan and Armenian Museum of America Executive Director Jason Sohigian as they discuss this landmark exhibit.
Our galleries in Boston/Watertown are open Thursday thru Sunday from 12-6.
This photograph of Andy Warhol with Joan Agajanian Quinn was taken in Texas in 1975, courtesy of the Joan Quinn Archives.
Boston Globe: A Lively West Coast Collection Lands in Watertown
From left: Thomas Ammann, Joan Agajanian Quinn, and Andy Warhol, 1979. Courtesy of the Joan Quinn Archives.
WATERTOWN, MA --Collectors have nothing to declare except their sensibility. Many, perhaps most, don’t have one. Joan Agajanian Quinn definitely does. Getting a handle on it is among the pleasures offered by “On the Edge: Los Angeles Art 1970s-1990s from the Joan and Jack Quinn Family Collection.” The show runs through Nov. 30 at the Armenian Museum of America.
On display are 125 works with more than 75 artists represented. Some of them you’ve likely heard of: Lynda Benglis, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Helmut Newton, Andy Warhol. Others you’ve also likely heard of have a particular association with Southern California: Ed Ruscha, David Hockney, Frank Gehry (a chair and “fish” lamp).
The title speaks to the Quinns’ tastes. What they collected wasn’t Old Masters or mainstream Modernists. They went in for contemporary artists, and not necessarily ones who would become established. Patrons as well as collectors, the Quinns weren’t placing bets. They were satisfying urges and unconcerned with conventions. The Quinns didn’t collect as an investment or for status. They collected things they wanted to own and live with.
Mirror Spectator: Quinn Exhibit Brings LA Cool to Armenian Museum
WATERTOWN, MA--The dual exhibits, “On the Edge: Los Angeles Art 1970s – 1990s from the Joan and Jack Quinn Family Collection” and “Discovering Takouhi: Portraits of Joan Agajanian Quinn,” currently on display at the Armenian Museum of America, merge the two facets of this woman: muse and supporter of the cool LA art scene as well as society patron in the Armenian community. It is hard to imagine anyone else able to draw a direct line connecting Andy Warhol to the Armenian International Women’s Association. Quinn does, however, and is equally at home in both worlds.
The exhibits, which will be on display through November 30, feature remarkable works of art from some of the most notable post-modernist and Pop artists, including Ed Ruscha, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol, and David Hockney, as well as many notable artists from Armenia, which the Quinns collected over the past six decades. Most would be right at home at a major metropolitan museum.
The woman at the center of it all, Quinn, was present for the grand opening on June 16 and took part in a private tour before the official opening reception. It was uncanny to be next to the woman who was represented in myriad forms on every wall. Many of the artists have captured the colorfulness — literally and figuratively — of this delightfully bubbly muse. In person, she appears much as she does in many of the portraits surrounding her, bright and sparkling, complete with fuchsia-tinged hair and bedecked in chunky jewelry.
California’s Most Notable Contemporary Artists from the Joan and Jack Quinn Family Collection Makes Debut in Boston
Accompanying Exhibition Presents Armenian Artists from the
Joan Agajanian Quinn Portrait Collection
Ed Ruscha, Mocha Standard #28/100, 1969, Silkscreen, 30.25 x 44.75 inches, courtesy of the Joan and Jack Quinn Family Collection.
WATERTOWN, MA – The Armenian Museum of America is pleased to present their largest contemporary exhibition, On the Edge: Los Angeles Art 1970s - 1990s from the Joan and Jack Quinn Family Collection. This selection of work explores a period that is pivotal to understanding current practices and the West Coast mentality. Included are Lita Albuquerque, John Altoon, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Lynda Benglis, Vija Celmins, Gregory Wiley Edwards, Claire Falkenstein, Frank Gehry, David Hockney, John M. Miller, Helmut Newton, Ed Ruscha, Andy Warhol, and more.
On the Edge premiered at the Bakersfield Museum of Art in 2021 and was curated by Rachel McCullah Wainwright. “The work and artists on display have come to represent a period of history that transformed art making,” said Wainwright. “Art made in Los Angeles during the late 1960s and 1970s onward is defined by a unique spirit of anti-conformity, a play of new materials, a celebration of light, and the California cool ethos.”
Part of what makes the collection so unique is its foundation in friendship between artist and collector. “Few individuals have left such an indelible mark on the artistic landscape of Southern California more than the Quinns,” says Wainwright.
Newly married in the 1960s, Joan and Jack took to collecting early. “We revelled in our friendship with the artists as we brought our communities together,” notes Quinn. Jack used his skills as a prominent and influential attorney to help an array of emerging artists and their dealers navigate the worlds of law and business, while Joan found herself both muse and promoter.
The companion exhibit, Discovering Takouhi: Portraits of Joan Agajanian Quinn, curated by Natalie Varbedian and Gina Grigorian includes Armenian artists such as Dahlia Elsayed, Jean Kazandjian, Silvina Der Meguerditchian, Ara Oshagan, Zaven Sarkissian, and Aram Saroyan. The distinctive works are a selection from Quinn’s unprecedented collection of portraits consisting of over 300 gifts by friends who have painted, sculpted and photographed her image in their style.
“We are incredibly excited to exhibit these prominent works owned by American-Armenian collectors Joan Agajanian Quinn and her daughters Amanda Quinn Olivar and Jennifer Quinn Gowey,” says AMA Executive Director Jason Sohigian. “We are a living museum that preserves and shares ancient and medieval artifacts and has a long tradition of also highlighting modern art in our galleries. These are certainly exhibits you will not want to miss.”
Joan is the co-host of Beverly Hills View and has been the producer and host of the Joan Quinn Profiles for over 35 years. The Los Angeles native was West Coast Editor of Andy Warhol’s Interview, Society Editor of Hearst’s Los Angeles Herald Examiner, and the founding West Coast Editor of Condé Nast Traveler. She has been appointed to an array of city and state commissions, and in 2017 Joan received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.
The exhibition opens on Thursday, June 16 with a reception for Museum members at 5:00 pm and a preview for non-members at 7:00 pm. It runs from June 16 to November 30 and is generously sponsored by the JHM Charitable Foundation.
The Armenian Museum of America’s galleries are open Thursday through Sunday from 12:00 pm to 6:00 pm, and it is located at 65 Main Street, Watertown, MA.