Society of Animal Artists: Dr. David J. Wagner

Showing posts with label Dr. David J. Wagner. Show all posts

Monday, December 3, 2018

Meet the Tour Director for the Society of Animal Artists

David J. Wagner, Ph.D.

The Society of Animal Artists is pleased to present this post highlighting our Tour Director, David J. Wagner. Dr. Wagner began working as the SAA Tour Director in 1988 and has taken the SAA all over the United States to a list of museum venues that would make any organization proud. He has achieved a remarkable career thus far and holds a particular fondness for the SAA and its artists.

Dr. Wagner at the Allentown Art Museum for the Premiere of his exhibition, American Wildlife Art

Presented to David J. Wagner in 2002 at the 42nd Annual Exhibition of the Society of Animal Artists at the Grand Opening of the Wildlife Experience in Denver, CO

In 1975, David's career was re-directed from the world of concerts to museums. After earning a bachelors degree in applied piano with a minor in voice, and being accepted into the Indiana University Music School as a Graduate Student, he took an elective course in Museum Studies as part of the curriculum for a Masters degree in Arts Administration from the Graduate School of Business, which he intended at the time, to lead to a career in concert management.

David J. Wagner, book signing at release of American Wildlife Art, Charleston , SC, February 2008

David was a museum director for 20 years and his career has been multifaceted. In the visual arts, he has focused much of his time and energy on the production of traveling museum exhibitions, which edify the public about wildlife, but also domesticated animals, ecology, and the environment. In 1998, he formed a limited liability corporation for the principle purpose of producing and managing traveling exhibitions for display at museums and related art, cultural and scientific institutions in North America and abroad.

David J. Wagner with artist, Robert Bateman

In addition to serving as President of that company for the past 20 years, David has spent a portion of that time as author (most notably, American Wildlife Art), lecturer, occasional guest curator, and adjunct faculty at colleges and universities.

Dr. Wagner directed an expedition of artists and naturalists to the Sea of Cortez in Mexico in 2011

David sometimes coordinates guest appearances by artists at venues hosting his company’s exhibitions, in addition to occasionally serving as guest speaker himself. He also serves as principle copy writer and editor of his exhibitions’ texts. But mostly, truth be known, he spends most of his time marketing and managing his traveling museum exhibitions.

ANTHOLOGY OF AUDIO INTERVIEWS OF SAA MEMBERS

Robert Bateman, Carel Pieter Brest Van Kempen, Kent Ullbergand Dr. David J. Wagner

February 27, 2003: Interview of Carel Pieter Brest van Kempen and David J. Wagner on The Nature of Things, FM 90 Utah Public Radio, Salt Lake City

February 2008: Interview of David Wagner by Dan Small on Outdoor Wisconsin, Wisconsin Public Television

August 28, 2008: Partial Interview Without Listener Phone Calls of David Wagner by Larry Meiller on Wisconsin Public Radio

August 28, 2008: Complete Interview including Listener Phone Calls of David Wagner by Larry Meiller on Wisconsin Public Radio

November 12, 2008: Interview of Kent Ullberg and David Wagner by Larry Meiller on Wisconsin Public Radio

November 17, 2008: Interview of Robert Bateman and David Wagner on KPBS, San Diego

September 14, 2010: Interview of Robert Bateman, Kent Ullberg, and David Wagner on KHOL 89.01 Jackson Hole Community Radio

THE SEA OF CORTEZ, Field Trip Documentary Produced by Molly Moore Fine Art for David J. Wagner, L.L.C. for the 2013 museum exhibition, THE SEA OF CORTEZ (Richard C. Brusca, Ph.D., Field Trip Leader, to San Carlos, Mexico from March 19-26, 2011)

February 1, 2016: Environmental Ideology in Art by David Wagner on TEDxMHK, Kansas State University, Manhattan

July 12, 2018: Interview of David J. Wagner by Bonnie North on Lake Effect at WUWM 89.7 Milwaukee's NPR Station

Among exhibitions produced or toured by David J. Wagner, L.L.C. are the following: America's Parks, American Birds, American Still Lifes, American Studio Glass, American Wildlife Art, Andrew Denman: The Modern Wild, Animals in Art, Art and the Animal (from the Society of Animal Artists), Art of the Dive / Portraits of the Deep, Art of the Rainforest, Biodiversity in the Art of Carel Pieter Brest van Kempen, Blossom ~ Art of Flowers, Brian Jarvi's African Menagerie, Cory Trépanier's Into The Arctic, Crocodilian Scratchboards by John Agnew, Endangered Species, Flora and Fauna in Peril, Environmental Impact, Exquisite Miniatures by Wes and Rachelle Siegrist, Feline Fine: Art of Cats, John James Audubon, Kent Ullberg: A Retrospective, LeRoy Neiman, On Safari, LeRoy Neiman: A Retrospective, Masters of American Photography, Masterworks from The International Guild of Realism, Paws and Reflect: Art of Canines, Robert Bateman - A Retrospective, Sandy Scott: A Retrospective, Sayaka Ganz: Reclaimed Creations, Society of Animal Artists National Geographic Society Outdoor Sculpture Garden, The Horse In Fine Art (annual exhibition of the American Academy of Equine Art), The Sea of Cortez, The Art of Robert Bateman, Thomas D. Mangelsen: A Life in the Wild. These exhibitions and others have toured and continue to tour to venues nationwide and in Canada under the auspices of David J. Wagner, L.L.C.

... and recent news as this blog goes to post: David is being honored in 2019 by The Dancing Star Foundation in Los Angeles, CA for his work! In 2010, he was the recipient of the SKBF Black-Parkman Award for Art Industry Leadership.

For more information about Dr. Wagner visit his website: davidjwagnerllc.com
For a synopsis of David's complete career, visit: Synopsis
Additional videos are posted here: YouTube

~ Rachelle Siegrist for the SAA

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Dr. David Wagner and Art and the Animal

Recently Kelly Lydick, Assistant Editor of Western Art Collector interviewed The Society of Animal Artists Art and the Animal Curator and Tour Director Dr. David J. Wagner. This is a great opportunity to see what happens behind the scenes of this prestigious annual exhibition.

What follows are the questions and answers form the interview between Kelly Lydich and Dr. David Wagner. The annual exhibition and tour venues list follows after the interview.

An Interview with Dr. David Wagner

Society of Animal Artists

Art and the Animal Exhibition

Curator and Tour Director

1. As the Tour Director, what is the most exciting part of your role in the annual event?

The Annual Exhibition is juried by leading members of the Society of Animal Artists each year in New York City. But I get to select the artworks that will tour the nation in the ART AND THE ANIMAL tour. That essential means that I get to choose the best of the best. Though I admit that there may be a tinge of pride at work here, I have always felt that the ART AND THE ANIMAL tour is higher in quality than the SAA Annual Exhibition, because it is ultra-refined. In other words, it is both juried and curated. And I get to play the role of the curator.

2. What informs your choices for locations for the Tour? How are the locations chosen/determined?

Several criteria factor into the selection of tour venues and orchestration of the tour itinerary. Our venues are not pseudo museums or commercial galleries or conference centers, but real museums generally accredited by the American Association of Museums. To be accredited by the AAM, museums must maintain the absolute highest professional standards of excellence. In addition, ART AND THE ANIMAL tour venues in any given year are diverse: that is, they include public and private art museums, natural history museums, and general museums, and occasionally art and nature centers and zoos. In addition, I strive for broad geographical exposure in multiple states.

3. What in particular is unique about this year’s Tour compared with years past?

This year, the Society’s 52nd Annual Exhibition is being hosted by The Hiram Blauvelt Art Museum in Oradell, New Jersey, an affluent bedroom community of the greater New York metropolitan area located a mere 15 miles from mid-town Manhattan, whose residents once included wildlife artist, Charles Livingston Bull (1874 - 1932). This marks the third time that The Blauvelt has hosted The Annual Exhibition of The Society of Animal Artists. Following the exhibit’s premiere, forty-five flatworks and fifteen sculptures will tour under the title, ART AND THE ANIMAL, to three subsequent venues: The Art Museum at The University of Kentucky in Lexington; the Kenosha Public Museum in Wisconsin; and The Charles H. MacNider Art Museum in Mason City, Iowa.

This is the first time that the exhibit has been displayed in the Bluegrass State of Kentucky, the state where I was born. As a special tribute, ART AND THE ANIMAL will be augmented at The Art Museum at The University of Kentucky in Lexingtonwith a special selection I have made of equine paintings and sculptures by Tom Altenburg, Anita Baarns, Jean Cook, Beth Parcell Evans, Terry Miller, Fay Moore, Marilyn Newmark, Kathleen Ryan, Francis E. Sweet, Kay Witherspoon, and Jan Woods. ART AND THE ANIMAL travels next to the Kenosha Public Museum, located mid-way between Chicago and Milwaukee, with over 70,000 artifacts including nearly 1,000 works of fine art. The museum also houses the Carthage Institute of Paleontology and The Dinosaur Discovery Museum, which focuses on the link between meat eating dinosaurs and birds. The Charles H. MacNider Museum, is a museum known for the quality of its American art collection. It contains excellent examples of work by some of the best known American artists of the 19th and 20th centuries including Arthur Dove, Thomas Hart Benton, John Matin, A. T. Bricher, Stephen deStaebler, Jasper Cropsey, Grant Wood, George Bellows, Henriette Wyeth, Nathan Oliveira, John Sloan, Maricio Lasansky, Morris Graves, Maria Martinet, G. P. A. Healey, Jack Levine, Toshiko Takeazu, Paul Soldner, Philip Guston, Sam Francis, Aaron Bohrod, among others.

4. Is there anything else you would like readers to know about this year’s tour…?

Since 1988, when Society of Animal Artists Vice President, Guy Coheleach recruited me as SAA Tour Director after I served as Director of the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum from 1977 - 1987, SAA exhibitions have been displayed some 85 times throughout the United States, with approximately 70% of hosting venues having been art museums or general museums that have included art as a central dimension of their core mission, with the remainder being natural history or nature-based institutions. This year's tour itinerary falls squarely within that tradition.The Hiram Blauvelt Art Museum, The Art Museum at The University of Kentucky, The Kenosha Public Museum, and The Charles H. MacNider Art Museum, are all top-notch museums that command peer respect by museum professionals nationwide. I am totally confident that any member of the Society of Animal Artists (or any other artist organization for that matter) would be proud to have their artwork displayed at any of the museums on this illustrious itinerary of museums. I know I am.