This major traveling retrospective, now on the European leg of its 8-stop tour, is the first comprehensive look at Steinberg's extraordinary contribution to 20th-century art. Steinberg's role, in curator Joel Smith's presentation, was that of a modern-day illuminator, putting word and image in play to create art that spoke to the eyes, and minds, of readers. The exhibition assembles examples of the remarkable range of works Steinberg produced during his prolific 60-year career--drawings, paintings, sculptures, photographs, prints, paper-bag masks, collages, murals, holiday cards, and stage sets--many of them never before exhibited.

Organized by the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College.

EUROPEAN ITINERARY

Fondation Cartier-Bresson, Paris, May 6-July 27, 2008

Kunsthaus Zürich, August 22-November 2, 2008

Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, November 26, 2008-February 15, 2009

Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg, March 13-June 1, 2009

The European tour of Steinberg: Illuminations is supported by a generous grant from the Terra Foundation for American Art, with additional funding from PaceWIldenstein Gallery.

At The Menil Collection, Houston (May 23-August 17, 2008). Guest curated by Sarah Eckhardt, the exhibition presents a focused and intimate look at the shared interests of Steinberg and his wife, Hedda Sterne, in the 1940s and 1950s, their years together. Although their work looks very different, both artists, from within their circle of New York artists, dealt with issues of artistic subjectivity and American life at the height of the Abstract Expressionist movement.

The Americans, Steinberg's monumental collaged panels for the American Pavilion at the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels, represent the climax of his career in public murals. Assembled from individual panels nearly 10 feet high, the 8 sections, treating such themes as Main Street--Small Town, Downtown--Big City, and Cocktail Party, offered a wry take on American life for Europeans visitors. The entire series, more than 260 feet long, is normally housed in the storerooms of the Musées Royaux de Beaux-Arts de Belgique in Brussels. To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the World's Fair, the museum has reassembled the above three and set them in the context of other contemporary art at the Fair. Through September 21, 2008. See www.fine-arts-museum.be

Saul Steinberg: Illuminations, the richly illustrated catalogue of the retrospective exhibition, is the first scholarly treatment of Steinberg's art. Published by Yale University Press, with an introduction by Charles Simic and essay and catalogue entries by Joel Smith. Its 288 pages and more than 300 reproductions include all the works in the show, along with previously unseen sketches, documents, and printed matter from the artist's papers as well as an extensive bibliography and career chronology.

Saul Steinberg, with an introduction by Iain Topliss, Delpire Éditeur, Paris. With more than 120 reproductions, this 5th volume in Delpire's Poche Illustrateur series offers a wide-ranging survey of Steinberg's career, from his cartoons of the early 1940s through his magazine features, drawings and gallery art, to the deeply personal work of his late years. Page after page reveals Steinberg's witty, incisive take on 20th-century life, seen through an eye never satisfied with one style, one way of rendering the world. Available in French. www.delpire.fr

Steinberg at The New Yorker, by Joel Smith, with an introduction by Ian Frazier, 240 pages, 363 illustrations (Harry N. Abrams, 2005). Nearly six decades of Steinberg's covers are reproduced in color, along with many examples of inside art, from black-line drawings to elaborate color portfolios.