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Extra-Ordinary: The Everyday Object in American Art: Selections from the Whitney Museum of American Art” opens at the New York State Museum April 2nd. Extending through July 10th in the Museum’s West Gallery, the exhibition is the 13th installment of the Bank of America (formerly Fleet Bank) Great Art Exhibition and Education Program, which brings art from New York City’s leading art museums to Albany. "The Bank of America is pleased to continue our support of the Great Art Series," said Jennifer McPhee, market president for Bank of America's Capital District and Upstate New York region. "Beginning in 1998, collections from the premier museums in New York City have provided world-class exhibitions and educational programs for the Great Art Series. The access and opportunity that the Great Art Series provides to visitors to the New York State Museum is a wonderful example of how public-private partnerships enhance the quality of life in Upstate New York."

Organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City and curated by Dana Miller, associate curator at the Whitney, the exhibition includes paintings, drawings, prints, photographs and sculptures from the Whitney’s permanent collection. Artists represented in the exhibition include Claes Oldenburg, Robert Rauschenberg, Jeff Koons, Andy Warhol, Vija Celmins, Jim Dine, Robert Gober and Fred Tomaselli.

The exhibition illuminates unexpected facets of the familiar -- the extraordinary within the ordinary -- through artworks that compel the viewer to examine their surroundings with fresh eyes. The artworks play with the traditional notion that art must be elevated beyond everyday life, both in its content and its medium. Spanning more than 65 years of American art, these works present a record of the culture in which they were created.

Following World War II America experienced a period of unprecedented economic growth and prosperity that included an abundance of consumer goods and a deluge of images -- from billboard advertisements and comic strips to product packaging on supermarket shelves. In the mid-1950s, a generation of emerging artists looked to these items as alternatives to Abstract Expressionism, the dominant mode of art making in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Artists such as Robert Rauschenberg used ordinary materials in their work. The electric cord and light in his mixed media work Blue Eagle (1961) snake into the larger environment in which they are placed, illuminating the space and connecting it with "real" life.

Building on these experiments, a number of vanguard artists in the 1960s incorporated both humor and irony in their work, celebrating America while satirizing its overabundance of material comforts. Art that appropriated popular imagery and the burgeoning commodity culture was loosely dubbed "Pop," a term that encompassed a wide variety of art. Swedish-born Claes Oldenburg created oversized, whimsical sculptures of everyday things, such as Giant BLT (Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato Sandwich) and French Fries and Ketchup (both1963). Andy Warhol was best known for his fascination with the trademarks and graphics of consumer goods. His Mott's Box (Apple Juice) (1964) is a hollow plywood box, but through the use of typeface and graphic design, Warhol transformed it into a crate of apple juice.

Many of the artists in this exhibition have been drawn to items whose shelf life was soon to expire, objects about to become artifacts from a specific moment in our material culture. What was once familiar becomes strangely exotic years later. The technology of the telephone and camera in Neil Winokur's mid-1980s photographs seems more archaic with each passing year. Jeff Koons treats vacuum cleaners as relics, hermetically sealing them in a lit display case, entirely divorced from their original function.

Other artists address a more autobiographical relationship to inanimate things, depicting objects of personal importance, or using them as metaphors for their experiences. Tony Feher titled his 1997 work Suture because, once completed, the sculpture of 57 cut plastic bottles and wire reminded him of the stitches on his torso after a major surgery.

Carefully distilling their subjects from their surroundings, the artists in this exhibition reveal the poetry and magic in the everyday. Their works continue to be relevant for American artists, enduring in some of the extraordinary artwork of the 21st century.

This exhibition was organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. This project is funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services by an Act of Congress.

The New York State Museum expresses its gratitude to Bank of America, First Lady Libby Pataki, the New York State Senate and New York State Assembly.

The State Museum is a cultural program of the New York State Department of Education. Started in 1836, the museum has the nation’s longest continuously operating state natural history research and collection survey. The museum is located on Madison Avenue in Albany. Further information is available by calling 474-5877 or visiting the museum website at www.nysm.nysed.gov.

The New York State Museum is located on Madison Avenue in Albany. It is open 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. seven days a week throughout the year except on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day. Further information about programs and events can be obtained by calling (518) 474-5877 or visiting the museum website at www.nysm.nysed.gov.