Highbrow Magazine - New York art scene https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/new-york-art-scene en Highlights from the Art World: 1960s New York, Eva Hesse, American Modernism https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/21027-highlights-art-world-1960s-new-york-eva-hesse-american-modernism <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/photography-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Photography &amp; Art</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Tue, 08/23/2022 - 15:40</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1jewishmuseum.jpg?itok=u7HQ8uy8"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1jewishmuseum.jpg?itok=u7HQ8uy8" width="361" height="480" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>New York: 1962-1964 </strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>The Jewish Museum</strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>(<em>Through January 8, 2023</em>)</strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">It may be hard to believe that just three years could change forever how artists in New York City (and much of the public as well) looked at and responded to their world.  But that’s exactly what happened. And nothing in the culture has been the same since.</span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">The Jewish Museum’s current exhibition takes visitors on a heady, whirlwind tour of the times, from videos of Walter Cronkite’s announcement of President Kennedy’s assassination to James Baldwin’s TV diabtribes with the philosopher of the day. There are set pieces to stumble upon, with Danish armchairs and plastic ashtrays placed in front of a black-and-white TV playing <em>The Munsters</em>, that evil family of witches that look pretty benign by today’s standards. <em>Life</em> magazine covers and poetry journals celebrating the likes of Frank O’Hara and Ed Sanders proliferate and wallpaper kitschy enough to put a smile on even the most erudite in the crowd.  And in the midst of it all, there’s the art. Painters, sculptors, dancers, filmmakers and poets jumped into the fray to make sense of it all. </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Particularly eye-catching is a 72”x60” painting by Marjorie Strider, entitled <em>Girl with Radish</em> (1963). It’s a mouth-watering entry that proves at least one pop female artist of the day could hold her own with the Big Boys. This is a not-to-be-missed show.  </span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/2jewishmuseum.jpg" style="height:650px; width:489px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/1evahesse.jpg" style="height:489px; width:651px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>Eva Hesse:  Expanded Expansion</strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>The Guggenheim Museum of Art</strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong><em>(Through October 16, 2022)</em></strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">“Life doesn’t last; art doesn’t last. It doesn’t matter.” Those words, spoken by the pioneering post-minimalist German-American sculptor Eva Hesse, define what makes the exhibition of her 1969 work at the Guggenheim resonate in the mind long after leaving the installation. </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Ten feet high, this monumental piece of rubberized cheesecloth panels, connected by rigid fiberglass and polyester resin poles forming “legs,” was first mounted by the Whitney Museum in 1969. Its current showing is a tribute to an artist who consistently thought “outside the box” -- taking materials from an abandoned factory in Germany and wielding them into soft and hard combinations that defied the logical parameters of geometric sculpture. The exhibition includes journals and an informative video that demonstrate the care that the conservators have taken to preserve a fading work that begs the question ‘should art last?’  Hesse died of a brain tumor at 34, much too soon for such a visionary, but someone who understood the transitory nature of everything.</span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/3guggenheim_9wallygva-wikimedia.jpg" style="height:433px; width:650px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong><em> </em></strong></span></span><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/1asl.jpg" style="height:651px; width:581px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong><em>“To Live Is To Paint” Wilhelmina Weber Furlong, Dorothy Dehner and American Modernism<br /> Phyllis Harriman Mason Gallery, The Art Students League </em></strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong><em>(Through August 23, 2022)</em></strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Often the single career of a particular artist is overshadowed by the times and circumstances of life itself. That could be said of post-impressionist painter Wilhelmina Weber Furlong (1878-1962) and modernist painter and sculptor Dorothy Dehner (1901-1994).  What happened instead for these two enormously talented women and long-time friends was a synergy of creative work that still stands as a testament to modernism and abstraction today. It was through such associations and brave leaps that abstraction began to percolate and ultimately change the way we look at art today.</span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Furlong and Dehner met at the Art Students League in 1925 and found an instant commonality of interests. Furlong and her husband Tomas (whom she had met while working in Mexico City as a translator for President Porfirio Diaz) mentored Dehner and others, hosting them at their Lake George retreat. Dehner’s early marriage to artist David Smith was a partnership that lasted until 1950, when she left that bucolic natural world for good. The work on display speaks volumes of artistic resilience. It gives me great pleasure that even if some readers do not get to view such an exhibit, perhaps they will make a note of such underrated talents.</span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/2asl.jpg" style="height:650px; width:504px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>Author Bio:</strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong><em>Sandra Bertrand is</em> Highbrow Magazine’s <em>chief art critic.</em></strong></span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>For Highbrow Magazine</strong></span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>Image Sources:</strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><em>--Sandra Bertrand</em></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><em>--<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Guggenheim_flw_show.jpg" style="color:#0563c1; text-decoration:underline">Wallygva</a> (Wikimedia, Creative Commons)</em></span></span></p> <p> </p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/art-exhibits" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">art exhibits</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/jewish-museum" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">jewish museum</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-1962-1964" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">new york 1962-1964</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/eva-hesse" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">eva hesse</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/guggenheim-6" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">the guggenheim</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/art-students-league" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">art students league</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/dorothy-dehner" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">dorothy dehner</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/wilhelmina-weber-furlong" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">wilhelmina weber furlong</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/live-paint" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">to live is to paint</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-art-scene" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">New York art scene</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Sandra Bertrand</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">In Slider</div></div></div> Tue, 23 Aug 2022 19:40:22 +0000 tara 11267 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/21027-highlights-art-world-1960s-new-york-eva-hesse-american-modernism#comments Jasper Johns at The Whitney: The Magician at Play https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/17079-jasper-johns-whitney-magician-play <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/photography-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Photography &amp; Art</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Sun, 11/21/2021 - 17:39</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1jasperjohns-three_flags_1958.jpg?itok=VS0yUZfi"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1jasperjohns-three_flags_1958.jpg?itok=VS0yUZfi" width="480" height="324" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">In the mid-1950s, Jasper Johns had a dream about an American flag. Shortly thereafter, he painted one of his first attempts at this iconic image, which was then discovered by famed dealer Leo Castelli and subsequently purchased by Alfred H. Barr, then director of the Museum of Modern Art.  Maps, targets, letters and numbers followed. By the ‘60s, Johns was to the average man or woman on the street, the artist who painted flags.  </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Of course, the trajectory of celebrity and greatness is more complicated. Even in the 21<sup>st</sup> century, understanding the man behind 60 decades of his works remains nearly impossible. In <em>Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror, </em>displaying as well as interpreting his artistic output is more to the point, and one that the Whitney Museum in New York under chief curator Scott Rothkopf and Carlos Basualdo, senior curator of contemporary art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, have made their mission. It’s a monumental one. </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Split between the two world-class museums, there are enough examples of the artist’s curiosity and versatility to satisfy his fans.</span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/2jasperjohns-target_with_four_faces_1955.jpg" style="height:600px; width:460px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Enough that a journey to experience the sheer number of paintings, prints, and sculpture on display in both venues is an option, but hardly necessary to enjoy the full spectrum of Johns’ ideas and obsessions.</span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">The flags are a good enough place to start. To paraphrase Gertrude Stein, a sometimes, frustrating stylist in her own right, “a flag is not just a flag is not just a flag.”  His encaustic creations employ brushstrokes in pigmented, bumpy wax, a technique rare at the time. Representational (an American flag), the imagery incorporating stripes—and in his Targets series, circles that hark back to the abstract—what you see is <em>not</em> what you get. The flag is capable of resonating within us the rawest of emotions.  </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">When <em>Flag</em> (1954-55) appeared on the scene, the Cold War was raging, then during the Vietnam War, when flag-burning became a public phenomenon, Johns’ manipulation of such images seemed almost commonplace. In his words, “They carry an incipient weight in our personal and public conscience.”</span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">What Johns had done with his art/life mix-up was to turn Abstract Expressionism on its head. According to critic Holland Cotter in the <em>New York Times</em> (September 24, 2021), Johns’ flags had “changed forever American art. They made gestural abstraction begin to look operatic and sappy and uncool.”  </span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/3jasperjohns-map_1961.jpg" style="height:380px; width:600px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">If Philadelphia gets the lion’s share of “Numbers” from the artist’s oeuvre, the Whitney memorializes the flags and maps in their own expansive gallery. With <em>3 Flags </em>(1958), the optics hypnotize: three blocks diminish in size from the foreground.  A gigantic multicolored map of the U.S. blurs the boundaries of state lines, at once a seemingly careless rendition but on the opposite wall, the same map of formidable size in dark charcoal shades. Color or the lack of it suddenly takes on an emotional charge to the viewer. <em>Target with Four Faces</em> (1955) is a powerful encaustic piece. The spiral target itself is the central focus yet the anonymity of the row of heads jutting forth from the top of the target is unsettling. The artist has managed to line them up like decoy ducks at a carnival. </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">In 1961, the long-term romantic relationship between artist Robert Rauschenberg and Johns ended, giving rise to a string of grey-toned paintings that put an end to the notion of his artworks signifying objective indifference. The complexities of the man himself were now in high relief. One of these darker works is stenciled at the top with the word “Liar.”  Words became fair game, along with any other imagery life and memory provided.   </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Born into a broken home on May 15, 1930, in Augusta, Georgia, Johns was an early victim of life’s uncertainties, shuttled between various relatives in South Carolina, arriving in New York as a young man of 25.  After studying briefly at Parsons School of Design, a stint in the Korean War in Japan followed. His return to New York and the encounter with Rauschenberg (well on his walk to painterly fame) changed his destiny.  When art dealer Castelli entered their downtown studio, he found Johns’ flags and other miscellany “an incredible sight ... something one could not imagine, new and out of the blue." He offered him a solo show on the spot.</span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/4jasperjohns_1964_ugo_mular.jpg" style="height:408px; width:600px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">The gay subculture of the day had its stars and Johns found friendships among the brightest in that firmament. The year of Johns’ breakup, he painted a darkly moving work, <em>In Memory of My Feelings – Frank O’Hara</em>. The poet in question, a central figure in Johns’ circle, died young from a tragic accident on the beach. Another arresting work on paper, <em>Diver </em>(1962-63) is an homage to Hart Crane, who jumped to his death from a ship. A fascination with Marcel Duchamp led to a shadowy interpretation of that artist in another work.</span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Defined by some as a progenitor of Pop Art, it’s not surprising that the artist’s bronze sculpture of a Savarin coffee can with brushes, as well as the accompanying prints take center stage in one installation. Surely Andy Warhol, an artistic contemporary and a genius at interpreting mass consumerism, found inspiration in that ubiquitous coffee can. </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">The most whimsically delightful painting for me is <em>Montez Singing</em> (1989), a surreal depiction of his step grandmother. Two eyes are placed at stray edges of the canvas, a squiggle of a nose that could be a stand-in for a cloud and a ripe lipstick mouth serves as a mountain range at the bottom. A small inset of a sailboat is reminiscent of “Red Sails in the Sunset,” which she sang to the young Johns.  </span></span></p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/5jasperjohns-untitled_2018.jpg" style="height:600px; width:413px" typeof="foaf:Image" /></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Death as a theme has a place in the artist’s obsessions. Later paintings depict skeletons as part of the imagery with a lightheartedness that makes one think the artist at 91 has come to terms with the issue of mortality. One work places the skeleton over an original silhouette of the artist from his own shadow. Another earlier and more somber image is based on a 1965 war photograph by Larry Burrows with Marine corporal James Farley crumpled in grief over the death of a comrade.  </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">A love of Japanese art and life following his military service led to a trip to that country in 1964. An increased fervor for printmaking was shared with friends there, and installations in both museums highlight this lifelong interest and relationships with major print houses around the globe. </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Strolling through this massive exhibition, retracing my steps more than once, I was struck with the myriad ways art plays with the mind, and in some instances, the emotions. But as celebrated as Jasper Johns is, he remains a mystery to his onlookers and many of his critics. A recipient of the National Medal of the Arts in 1990, and the Medal of Freedom in 2011, one of the highest-paid artists in many a given year, he leaves works that mystify, then exits, leaving us to ponder what other tricks he will pull out of the hat. </span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong><em>Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror runs through February 13<sup>th</sup> at the Whitney Museum of American Art.</em></strong></span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>Author Bio:</strong></span></span></p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong><em>Sandra Bertrand is</em> Highbrow Magazine’s <em>Chief Art Critic.</em></strong></span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif"><strong>For Highbrow Magazine</strong></span></span></p> <p> </p> <p><strong><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">Images (courtesy of The Whitney Museum):</span></span></strong></p> <p><em><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">--Three Flags (1958)</span></span></em></p> <p><em><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">--Target With Four Faces (1955)</span></span></em></p> <p><em><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">--Map (1961)</span></span></em></p> <p><em><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">--1964--Ugo Mular</span></span></em></p> <p><em><span style="font-size:18px"><span style="font-family:Times New Roman,Times,serif">--Untitled (2018)</span></span></em></p> <p> </p> <p> </p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/jasper-johns" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">jasper johns</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/whitney-museum-0" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">the whitney museum</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/contemporary-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Contemporary art</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-exhibits" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">new exhibits</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/art-exhibits" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">art exhibits</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-art-scene" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">New York art scene</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/three-flags" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">three flags</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/montez-singing" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">montez singing</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/robert-rauschenberg" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Robert Rauschenberg</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Sandra Bertrand</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">All images courtesy of The Whitney Museum</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Sun, 21 Nov 2021 22:39:09 +0000 tara 10756 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/17079-jasper-johns-whitney-magician-play#comments Art That Shaped a Nation: 80 Years of Native American Painting https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/10382-art-shaped-nation-80-years-native-american-painting <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/photography-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Photography &amp; Art</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Wed, 01/29/2020 - 20:14</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1nativeart.jpg?itok=_081jseQ"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1nativeart.jpg?itok=_081jseQ" width="328" height="437" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p>Most of us have a passing acquaintance of Native American art, and some of us from an early age—TV and film sagas of cowboys and Indians that led us on family vacations to the iconic treasures of a trading post.  Indian headdresses, tomahawks, colorful drums, turquoise jewelry, maybe even a dream-catcher or two we could add to our collection once back home.</p> <p>A visit to the <a href="https://www.si.edu/newsdesk/releases/upcoming-exhibition-smithsonians-national-museum-american-indian-examines-modern">National Museum of the American Indian</a>’s current exhibition, “Stretching the Canvas, Eight Decades of Native Painting,” at the Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House in New York City, will at the least challenge those lifelong presumptions.  Better still, it will prove that artistic genius is alive and thriving among the First Americans.  While the rest of us were in thrall of every new artistic movement making waves on the urban scene, these Navajo, Cherokee, Hopi, Crow, Cheyenne (and the list goes on) descendants were working behind the scenes all along to revolutionize our thinking.</p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/2nativeart.jpg" style="height:475px; width:356px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>A beginning training ground for Oklahoma Native nations was led by Acee Blue Eagle who taught at Bacone College in Muskogee, Oklahoma.  These artists worked in an illustrative style -- <em>The Shalako People</em> by Fred Kabotie (1900-1986) from 1930 is a good example. Self-taught Indian painters educated in government-run schools were discouraged from individual innovation.  A 1930 government feasibility study warned: “Teaching unless properly supervised, is capable of destroying native arts.” But this would soon change.</p> <p>Quincy Tahoma (1917-1956) was an early member of the Santa Fe Indian School’s Studio program, breaking away from their static style, incorporating narrative and perspective in his works.  In <em>First Furlough 1943</em>, a Navajo family mirrors the nation’s wartime experiences. </p> <p>An early abstractionist in this eclectic mix was George Morrison (1919-2000) who gravitated to NYC’s Art Students League after WWII, and quickly embraced abstract expressionism with bold colors and spontaneous strokes.  After all, Native designs on pottery, blankets, and baskets had always been abstract, so some believed they were instinctively ahead of the curve.</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/3nativeart.jpg" style="height:356px; width:475px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>This spirit of change in the air did not go unnoticed by Native American women artists, and several of their works on display take center stage for this reviewer. Helen Hardin (1943-1984) gives us <em>Prayers of a Hopi Eagle</em> (1965) utilizing traditions of pottery design in an elegant swirling abstraction.  Kay Walkingstick (b.1935-) presents a brooding and dramatic abstract work, <em>Homage to Chief Joseph I (1975)</em> with colors reminiscent of a dying desert sunset placed inside of what appears to be a black proscenium theatre curtain.  Another later work, <em>New Mexico Desert</em> (2011) is a more expressionistic landscape of ochre buttes and roiling white clouds.  Judith Lowry (b.1948) has created  <em>Her Fortune</em> (1993), an instant draw to the eye with two women—a Madonna-like fortune-teller and sitting opposite her, a gussied-up, modern-day Indian princess who reacts to the fortune-cookie readings in front of her.  There’s a riveting, tongue-in-cheek quality to the work that is unforgettable.</p> <p> </p> <p>This is an exhibition full of surprises, as the artists shift their perspectives -- rejecting at times a rigid allegiance to their forebearers and accepting the artistic sway of art movements in the wider culture. </p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/4nativeart.jpg" style="height:356px; width:475px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>In 1962, the Rockefeller Foundation initiated the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe, New Mexico, which taught graphic design and painting reflecting Pop Art and modernist abstraction.  A perfect example of this evolution is in the work of Harry Fonseca (1946-2006).  He created an alter-ego, Coyote, in his paintings who appears here in <em>Dance Break</em> (1982) as four Koshare—Pueblo sacred clowns—eating cotton candy and smoking as they rest from feast day dances.  Irreverent and whimsical, this work in pale pinks and charcoals lets loose the artist’s illustrative talents.</p> <p>Dan Namingha (b. 1950) proves himself a striking colorist with <em>Pueblo at Dusk</em> (1987), a gorgeous display of acrylic washes lighting up an adobe village at the end of day.  Fritz Scholder (1937-2005) startles with his politically charged portrait, <em>The American Indian</em> (1970), wrapped in the American flag.  It’s as if the elderly chief had been asked unwittingly to pose for a TV commercial. </p> <p>Tony Abeyta (b.1965) has created a work of majestic complexity in its overall composition.  An honorable testament to its subject,<em> The Grand Canyon</em> (2015) captures the changing moods of that natural wonder by a powerful and kinetic collision of planes.</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/5nativeart.jpg" style="height:475px; width:356px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>Arguably, the most haunting work is <em>Deer Dancer for Hyacinth</em> (2001) by Rick Bartow.  (1946-2016).  A Pacific Northwest artist, he fought with addiction and post-traumatic stress that emerges in his dark compositions.  Here, his distorted male figure appears to be in a state of transformation, his head sprouting antlers.  The power of this large pastel, charcoal, and pencil drawing suggests the raw intensity of Austrian painter Egon Schiele’s naked portraits.</p> <p>It would be remiss not to mention the Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House, one of the most beautiful examples of Beaux Art architecture in the city.  Designed by Cass Gilbert (who later designed the Woolworth Building), it now houses the George Gustav Heyes Center of the National Museum of the American Indian (the New York branch of the Smithsonian collection in Washington, DC.)  The Custom House is also home to the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern district of New York, and since 1912, the National Archives at New York City. </p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/6nativeart.jpg" style="height:356px; width:475px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>For those visitors interested in viewing this stunning example of modern and contemporary Native art on view until Fall 2021, I recommend allowing extra time to appreciate the lavish sculptures, paintings and decorations that embellish the façade of the Custom House, the two-story entry portico, the main hall, and especially the second floor rotunda, where you will find a cycle of murals from 1937 by Reginald Marsh, commissioned by the Treasury Relief Art Project and aided by the Works Project Administration (WPA).</p> <p>And, if you’re so inclined, the gift shop directly opposite the exhibition is chockfull of Native American sculpture, jewelry, pottery, publications, and souvenirs to satisfy any and every budget.  If New York residents and tourists alike would put a visit to this museum on their wish list, these remarkable Native artists would be that much closer to the inclusion in the larger society they deserve.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong><em>The free exhibition runs through Fall 2021 at the National Museum of the American Indian New York, One Bowling Green, New York City.</em></strong></p> <p> </p> <p><strong><em>Author Bio:</em></strong></p> <p> </p> <p><strong><em>Sandra Bertrand is </em></strong><strong>Highbrow Magazine’s</strong><strong><em> chief art critic.</em></strong></p> <p> </p> <p><strong>For Highbrow Magazine</strong></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/museum-american-indian" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Museum of the American Indian</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/native-american-artists" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">native american artists</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/indian-american-paintings" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">indian american paintings</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-art-scene" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">New York art scene</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/smithsonian" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Smithsonian</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/dan-namingha" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">dan namingha</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/tony-abeyta" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">tony abeyta</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/george-morrison" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">george morrison</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/rick-bartow" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">rick bartow</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Sandra Bertrand</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">All photos courtesy of the Museum of the American Indian</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Thu, 30 Jan 2020 01:14:06 +0000 tara 9322 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/10382-art-shaped-nation-80-years-native-american-painting#comments “Breathless” Exhibit Features Gorgeous, Grotesque Animal Art https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3790-breathless-features-gorgeous-grotesque-animal-art <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/photography-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Photography &amp; Art</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Wed, 03/05/2014 - 09:34</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1breathlessCatron_Outlaw_Brochure_Print.jpg?itok=YdzH4FTX"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1breathlessCatron_Outlaw_Brochure_Print.jpg?itok=YdzH4FTX" width="480" height="319" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p>Picture an eclectic exhibit featuring among others, coyotes, rabbits and even a snowy white mountain goat thrown in for good measure.  And I’m not talking about a visit to the local Museum of Natural History, or even a neighborhood taxidermist.  It’s an art show.  Even if the subjects are no longer breathing, at least with a little imagination, some of them manage to come startlingly alive. </p> <p>The House of the Nobleman, a New York and London-based organization known for fostering the careers of artists through a series of prestigious arts events, has mounted an eye-opening show, <em>Breathless</em>, at the Rush Art Gallery in the heart of New York’s Chelsea area.  Through various media, including taxidermy, painting, drawing, embroidery, and sculpture, the various objects on display manage to be alternately gorgeous and grotesque.  At its worst, the exhibit runs the risk of elevating shock over substance.  At its best, it makes us rethink the mortality of a once living creature and whether art itself can resuscitate its existence. </p> <p>Upon entering, several pieces take center stage—Marc Swanson’s elk antlers, awash in jet black crystals, is an artful construct, in contrast to his trophy head buck on a nearby wall, covered in crystals worthy of a disco ballroom.  Joey Parlett’s Sandwich #6 reveals an exquisitely rendered ink and watercolor drawing, a mix of tiger heads surrealistically placed between two slices of bread. A curio case is chockfull of goodies—a particularly winsome pigeon in party hat by Jackie Mock is worth mentioning, atop a stack of books with such titles as <em>Abe Lincoln of Pigeon Creek </em>and Galsworthy’s <em>The Pigeon</em>. </p> <p>Kimberly Witham’s archival pigment prints “<em>On Ripeness and Rot!</em>” reveal a microscopic attention to detail.  Like Dutch paintings from the Golden Age—filled with  flowers, fruit in decay and objects of the hunt—they exemplify the brevity of life.  The most hypnotic assemblage on display is <em>Rising</em> by Andrea Stanislav, a taxidermy coyote with a rabbit in its jaw, suspended from the ceiling along with aurora borealis crystal pendants, over a mirror glass pedestal. </p> <p>Two standout entries in the back room include Hugh Hayden’s <em>American Hero #2</em>, a taxidermy mountain goat whose white coat is elaborately braided by the artist.  The animal stands proud atop a foundation of bricks.  Are we to assume the goat has lost its footing in an urban world?  Whatever the intent, it’s an attention-grabber.  Dustin Yellin’s <em>Jaws</em> is a fantasy recreation of an antediluvian skeleton, according to director Kristin Sancken (a former <em>Highbrow Magazine</em> contributor), from his personal collection--an intricate layering of glass panes, resin poured between each layer, resulting in a collage of singular brilliance. </p> <p>It’s a timely exhibit, especially in light of Nathaniel Rich’s “the New Origin of the Species” article in the <em>New York Times</em> <em>Magazine</em> (March 2, 2014).  He notes that the last captive passenger pigeon, “Martha,” died at the Cincinnati Zoo on September 1, 1914.  A now extinct species among many others, he tells us that the pigeon’s nesting ground “once occupied an area as large as 850 square miles, or 37 Manhattans.”  Through new genomic technologies in the works, a Harvard molecular biologist believes resurrection of the species is within sight. </p> <p>If each and every part of the show doesn’t leave the viewer breathless, it may at least breathe new life into species other than our own through the alchemy of art, helping us better appreciate our co-existence on the planet.  And that’s a very worthy enterprise.</p> <p><strong>(<em>Breathless</em>, a House of the Nobleman exhibit, is currently on view at the Rush Art Gallery, 526 West 26<sup>th</sup> Street, #311, New York, NY  10002 through April 11<sup>th</sup>, 212 691-9552).</strong></p> <p> </p> <p><strong><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2breathlessDustin_Yellin_Brochure_Print.jpg" style="height:348px; width:625px" /></strong></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/3breathlessHayden_Americanhero2.jpg" style="height:481px; width:625px" /></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/4breathlessParlett_Sandwich_6_Brochure_Print.jpg" style="height:1730px; width:625px" /></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/5breathlessSwanson_Scraped_Elk_Brochure_Print.jpg" style="height:420px; width:625px" /></p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/1breathlessCatron_Outlaw_Brochure_Print.jpg" style="height:416px; width:625px" /></p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p><em>Sandra Bertrand is a contributing writer at </em>Highbrow Magazine<em> and the magazine’s Chief Arts Critic.</em></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/house-nobleman" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">house of the nobleman</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/breathless-exhibit" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">breathless exhibit</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">art</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-artists" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">new york artists</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-art-scene" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">New York art scene</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/animal-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">animal art</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Sandra Bertrand</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Featured art: Catron - Outlaw; Dustin Yellin; Hayden - American Hero; Parlett - Sandwich</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Wed, 05 Mar 2014 14:34:08 +0000 tara 4381 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3790-breathless-features-gorgeous-grotesque-animal-art#comments Art: The Expressive Edge of Paper https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3758-art-expressive-edge-paper <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/photography-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Photography &amp; Art</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Mon, 02/24/2014 - 09:24</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1PAPERNassos%20Daphnis_SS-2-78_1978_acrylic%20on%20paper_30x22%20%281%29.jpg?itok=iNEHWwAD"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1PAPERNassos%20Daphnis_SS-2-78_1978_acrylic%20on%20paper_30x22%20%281%29.jpg?itok=iNEHWwAD" width="348" height="480" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p>The Anita Shapolsky Gallery in New York City is presenting a multifaceted group of abstract paper works by 27 artists the gallery has exhibited over the</p> <p>years.</p> <p> </p> <p>Paper experimentation shows the dichotomy between planning aspects in art and free form automatic drawing. These works show great technical skill which brings the artists visions to life. The works gives incredible insights into their diverse approaches and the timelessness of their art.</p> <p> </p> <p>The molten iron paintings by Michael Dominick, for example, result in gestural strokes and splashes, which create beautiful and unpredictable marks that not only scorch the surface but also burn down into the depths of the layered paper.</p> <p> </p> <p>The abstract photographs of Aaron Siskind evoke wonder at his ingenuity. Antoni Tàpies's prints are a good introduction to his ideas for earthly paintings. Richards Ruben's oil pastel paintings of Venetian walls on Kochi paper are ethereal. Agustin Fernandez's exquisite prints done in Paris by Lacouriere et Frelaut evoke sensuality using mechanical parts (i.e.screws, pipes, etc.).</p> <p> </p> <p>Artists include: Mario Bencomo, Robert Blackburn, Seymour Boardman, Ilya Bolotowsky, Ernest Briggs, Lawrence Calcagno, Pérez Celis, Nassos Daphnis, Beauford Delaney, Michael Dominick, Herman Cherry, Amaranth Ehrenhalt, Claire Falkenstein, Agustín Fernández, Grace Hartigan, John Hultberg, Elaine Kurtz, Joel Le Bow, William Manning, Henri Michaux, Richards Ruben, Ann Ryan, William Saroyan, Kendall Shaw, Aaron Siskind, Antoni Tàpies, and Petra Valentova.</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2PAPERFalkenstein_Untitled_1960s_L.jpg" /></p> <p>Claire Falkenstein, Mandala #1, 1980, sugar lift etching, 35 x 23 in</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/3PAPERHenri%20Michaux_Untitled_1973_acrylic_paper_22x14%203_4.jpg" /></p> <p>Henri Michaux, Untitled, 1973, acrylic on paper, 22 x 14 3/4 in</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/4PAPERBeauford%20Delaney_Untitled_Ibiza_1956_gouache_watercolor_17%207_8x11%2013_16_L.jpg" /></p> <p>Beauford Delaney, Untitled (Ibiza), 1956, gouache and watercolor on paper, 17 7/8 x 11 13/16 in</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/5PAPERMario%20Bencomo_Torquemada%20series_Inquisition%20Hoods_2001_acrylic%20on%20paper_11x14_W.jpg" /></p> <p>Mario Bencomo, Torquemada series - Inquisition Hoods, 2001, acrylic on paper, 11x14 in</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/6PAPERRubens_pink%20a%20boob_1988_mm%20on%20kochi%20paper_30x42.jpg" /></p> <p>Richards Ruben, Pink a boob, 1988, Mixed media on kochi paper, 30 x 42 in</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/7PAPERBolotowsky_lithograph_untitled%2037%201-2%20x27%201-2_W.jpg" /></p> <p>Ilya Bolotowsky, Untitled, 1970's lithograph, 37 1/2  x 27 1/2 in</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/8PAPERSiskind_Lima_89_photo_1975_W.jpg" /></p> <p>Aaron Siskind, Lima 89, 1975, photograph, 24 x 20 in</p> <p> </p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/anita-shapolsky-gallery" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">anita shapolsky gallery</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">new york</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-artists" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">new york artists</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-art-scene" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">New York art scene</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/artists" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">artists</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/painters" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">painters</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Various Artists</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Nassos Daphnis</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Mon, 24 Feb 2014 14:24:55 +0000 tara 4311 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3758-art-expressive-edge-paper#comments How Pop Art Icon Peter Max Became the Quintessential American Artist https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/2416-how-pop-art-icon-peter-max-became-quintessential-american-artist <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/photography-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Photography &amp; Art</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Thu, 05/09/2013 - 10:01</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1petermax.JPG?itok=Ji7IZqmA"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1petermax.JPG?itok=Ji7IZqmA" width="480" height="286" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p>Is there any artist more American than Peter Max? Credited with the invention of psychedelic art, there are few people in this country who have not come in contact with his work.  In fact, through his mass media licensing he has become somewhat of a household name.</p> <p> </p> <p>Max’s studio is a massive 10,000 square foot loft on the Upper West Side of Manhattan filled with  photographs of the artist with every president from Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter to Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, George Bush and, of course, Barack Obama. The rest of the space is filled with paintings of patriotic icons and pop culture subjects: athletes, the New York City skyline, sporting events, even Taylor Swift have somehow come to find refuge in Max’s work. After contemplating the artist’s past and strategic rise to success, one might conclude that Max was one of the first immigrant artists to completely fulfill the American dream.</p> <p> </p> <p>Born in Berlin in 1937, Max and his family fled Nazi-Germany to Shanghai where he would spend the first 10 years of his life. It was here where Max’s father, a reputable businessman, and mother first began to notice his artistic talents. The pair hired the daughter of a street vendor to conduct art lessons and serve as a nanny. Max began his formal art training at the Art Students League of New York in Manhattan where he studied realism under Frank Reilly. Upon graduation, he realized that, because of photography, realism had been deemed obsolete and began exploring his own illustrative and graphic techniques that would eventually lead to the broad spectra of shapes and colors that would come to define his work. Coincidentally, his time in Shanghai would prove invaluable.</p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2petermax.JPG" style="height:304px; width:576px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>As Max puts it, “I learned how to draw in China and I drew my whole life, but I always thought I would become an astronomer.  It wasn’t until I was right out of high school that I decided to go to art school for one summer and I stayed there for seven-and-a-half years. I never became an astronomer even though it is still my single most curious subject in the world. What is out there in the universe?  That is why you see a lot of stars and planets in my art….“The influence from China and my youth came out in these drawings and I, as you know, I became very famous for that.</p> <p> </p> <p>Max further elaborates: “It was always my own way and my own road, and I never looked at anybody else. I always loved to draw but I didn’t think it was ever something I could let people see. But when Realism calmed down, at that point, people loved my drawings.”</p> <p> </p> <p>At first, Max’s art, characterized by dark line work, cosmic innuendos, and intense bursts of colors, served as an integral part of the counterculture and psychedelic movement of the 1960s until new printing techniques allowed for his work to be reproduced on product merchandise. As a result, Max’s art was eventually licensed to 72 corporations and his reputation was escalated to celebrity status, landing the artist spots on Johnny Carson, the <em>Ed Sullivan Show</em>, and the cover of <em>Life</em> Magazine with the heading "Peter Max: Portrait of the artist as a very rich man.” Seeing the magazine, Max recalls, was the first time he ever recognized his fame.</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/3petermax.JPG" style="height:496px; width:500px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>“I was walking down the street with my son who pointed at a magazine and said, ‘Daddy, its you!’ And I looked down and saw myself on a magazine. I was about 30, I guess. And that was the first time I ever realized who I was.” Since then, Max has done approximately 1,100 magazine covers, countless museum retrospectives, published an array of books, and has even designed one of Continental Airlines' Boeing 777-200ER aircrafts.</p> <p> </p> <p>Fame, fortune, and a half-decade-long career have caused no effect on the sprightly artist. Even though he surrounds himself with awards, pictures, magazine covers, and other mementos from the past (like a piano signed by Ringo Starr),  Max’s eyes stay on the future.  </p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/4petermax.JPG" style="height:400px; width:347px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>“As I’m about a block away (from my studio), I have this momentum in my heart,” he explains. “My heart is beating like when you’re about to see someone that you love. It is beating because I know I’m going to be painting any minute now. When I get here, the music is playing. I pick up a brush. The canvas is on the easel. I dip the brush into a color. I paint a few brushstrokes and I answer it was another brush stroke and then another. Before you know it, an image comes out. I let it come to me. It’s here and it’s now.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Like many other critics, I have always respected the cultural significance of Peter Max yet classified his work as nothing more than Pop Art. Yet after an afternoon spent discussing his work, I learned that in truth, Max’s work is undefinable. While his initial work did challenge the traditions of fine art through commercial endeavors, it lacked the conceptual congruence and irony that defined the movement. Instead, there is a purity in Max’s intent that transcends over-intellectualized elitism.</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/5petermax.JPG" style="height:400px; width:500px" /></p> <p> </p> <p>Whereas Warhol and his counterparts sought to distance themselves from commercial material through parody, Max saw mainstream media as an opportunity for financial and professional gain, an ethos commonly associated with capitalist ideologies. In addition, from a hindsight post-postmodern perspective, one may more accurately view Max as a precursor to Simulationism, the artistic movement created around the relationship between man and object often associated with Jeff Koons and Murakami, through his blending of tradition and society. Nonetheless, Max’s work is deeply iconographic and lacks the banality exploited in these high art, low art fusions.</p> <p> </p> <p>Instead, Max’s art is symbolic of his cultural upbringing. As a Holocaust refugee raised in Shanghai, he gained an Eastern understanding that art and commerce could be blended. As an American immigrant during post-war economic expansion, he was not yet jaded by politics and saw the Golden Age of Capitalism as an opportunity for growth. As a result, Max’s art is less of an appropriation of imagery and more a celebration of the ideal of prosperity and success through hard work. With globalization and economic turmoil, it is rare that one gets to meet an artist as stimulated as Max is by freedom. Yet much like his innate fascination with the Statue of Liberty, he stands as a symbol that life can be richer and fuller despite social class or circumstances. Max himself remains both an admired and celebrated and long-standing artistic anomaly.</p> <p> </p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/7petermax.JPG" style="height:320px; width:400px" /></p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p><em>Kristin Sancken is an art critic at </em>Highbrow Magazine.</p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/peter-max" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">peter max</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/pop-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">pop art</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/american-artists" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">american artists</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/realism" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">realism</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/art-movements" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">art movements</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-art-scene" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">New York art scene</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-artists" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">new york artists</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/celebrity-artists" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">celebrity artists</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kristin Sancken</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Thu, 09 May 2013 14:01:06 +0000 tara 2824 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/2416-how-pop-art-icon-peter-max-became-quintessential-american-artist#comments Ben Blatt and the Art of Watercolor https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1661-ben-blatt-and-art-watercolor <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/photography-art" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Photography &amp; Art</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Wed, 10/10/2012 - 17:33</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/medium1benblatt.jpg?itok=AUAO6Px6"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/medium1benblatt.jpg?itok=AUAO6Px6" width="480" height="342" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p> When watercolor emerged during the Renaissance, botanical artists quickly solidified their place as the most ambitious and accomplished painters working in the medium. These nature-based illustrations are among the oldest and most important traditions in watercolor painting. Many contemporary watercolor painters continue to promote the medium, hearkening back to traditional concepts of rendering, clarifying, and idealizing nature in full color with painstaking technical precision.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Brooklyn-based artist Ben Blatt has emerged as one of the most exacting watercolorists in the contemporary art world. It would be hard to describe Blatt’s work without using the word striking. His lush paintings of overgrown terrariums and botanical bell jars open ones eyes to elaborate fantasy worlds full of ornate details, exquisite visual components, and utopian narratives. Blatt’s pieces are evocative of a natural reverie completely encompassing the infinite mystery and fragility of the world around us.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Unlike most artists who work in this medium, Blatt’s interest in watercolor painting began solely as a practicality. While traveling through Europe in college he could not carry anything but watercolors and a sketchbook. As he slowly started to understand the medium through the slow process of sculpting out light and rendering line, Blatt began to strengthen his signature creative approach.</p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2medium2benblatt.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 378px; " /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Surrounded by historical iconography, he found himself inspired by studying the grotesque. This obsession with the aberrant eventually led Blatt to create his own grotesque works that married the precious with the absurd in an anomalous artistic vocabulary.</p> <p>  </p> <p> While at first glance Blatt’s work seems deeply rooted in tradition, his process is anything but. Innately interested in the inadequacies of modern technology, Blatt will often look at the microscopic cell structure of plants or bugs to inspire new visual characteristics in his work. As he puts it, “I’ll try and look for the glitch where perfect vision falls apart and is out of reach. You almost don’t trust an image any more if you don’t see pixels, if you can’t zoom in on it. The detail on that is so natural to me. I’m really inspired to see when distortions are pushed to the extreme.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Though traditional collage is still a very big part of his modus operandi, Blatt has found a recent affinity for creating hyper realities on the computer. He begins by layering image upon image in Photoshop to construct his elaborate compositions and determine color arrangements. Once the collage process is finished, the intensive and time-consuming task of painting the piece follows.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/3medium3benblatt.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 583px; " /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Blatt works anywhere from 10 to 14 hours a day mixing paint, breaking down color palettes, and re-applying his brush over and over again. However, this laborious process coincides with the eminence in his work. “The medium takes you to a sublime place,” Blatt offers. “There is something about the repetition and the line. You almost go into a meditative state. I like the whole process of carving out life and bringing life into something else.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> His paintings often begin with a simple base idea and end in a bottomless amalgamation of visual and emotional references. The artist purposefully leaves out a personal narrative and instead leaves it to us to decipher meanings in the piece. He finds it important to reward the viewer by allowing them to build their own stories and see things that aren’t there.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/4mediumbenblatt.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 476px; " /></p> <p>  </p> <p> To Blatt, the assimilation of references is more interesting than creating work that is overly romanticized. “I’m really interested in people taking an image in their head to other places, the sublime, the fragility of things around us that we don’t really take time to look at.” He says,” One thing I can say about watercolors is that it can be so expressive but it’s also so fragile.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> While Blatt’s distinct creative approach and visual language make his works seem almost whimsical, it is the underlying grotesque qualities that make them pervasive. His obsession with time, birth and death, decaying infrastructures, and constant evolution are masked behind bold color application and playful rendering. However his lack of pretention, and ability to illustrate the magic of nature, make Blatt’s paintings accessible to almost anyone. Often using cheerful colors to mask more cryptic, somber emotions, his work can be seen as both decorative and dark, fantasy and reality, hopeful and haunting.</p> <p>  </p> <p> After I got past the awe of his intrinsic talent and methodological eccentricity, I found an unequivocal rarity in Blatt’s art. His enigmatic work is darkly amusing, aesthetically pleasing, yet holds a clandestine quality that visually actualizes the beauty of life’s anti-poetry. Undoubtedly, Blatt’s unorthodox approach to creation will continue to bring him success in the contemporary art market while embellishing the narrative of an oft overlooked medium.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <em>For more information, visit <a href="http://www.benblatt.com">www.benblatt.com</a></em></p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p> <em>Kristin Sancken is a contributing writer</em> <em>at</em> Highbrow Magazine.</p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/ben-blatt" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Ben Blatt</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/watercolors" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">watercolors</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/artist-ben-blatt" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">artist Ben Blatt</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/new-york-art-scene" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">New York art scene</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Kristin Sancken</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Wed, 10 Oct 2012 21:33:49 +0000 tara 1712 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1661-ben-blatt-and-art-watercolor#comments