Historic Native American beadwork in American art gallery at Joslyn Art Museum. Plains beadwork work side-by-side with Mary Cassatt and Childe Hassam work within the American gallery. It borrows a phrase that Steadman saved repeating to exhibition coordinator Andrea Harris through the planning of the show, but fittingly alludes to the sheer scope of works on view as much because the artist’s restlessness. It’s the uncommon cartoonist, in spite of everything, who can mine the medium’s riches, whereas see this adding to—and transforming—it. Steadman’s earliest works, for publications together with Punch and Private Eye, had been provocative cartoons that took aim on the political powers that be—shrewd creations that superior the U.K.’s satire growth of the Sixties. The painter has been outspoken about no longer wanting gallery illustration, though his partnership with Gagosian seems to be ongoing.
