tissot 180

A mini-exhibit in honor of the elegant work of French artist James Tissot, born 180 years ago in Nantes, on October 15, 1836 (d. 1902).

Pictured

Self-Portrait -- 1865 
A Passing Storm -- 1876

Young Ladies Looking at Japanese Objects -- 1869

The Thames -- 1867

Mary Magdalene Before Her Conversion -- ca. 1886-1894

benton and pollock

This is a reposting of a Suite101 article I wrote a couple years ago, just making note of Jackson Pollock's birthday today and who and where he was before he became Jack the Dripper:

In 1930, future Abstract Expressionist Jackson Pollock was a causeless rebel from Wyoming, with some inclination towards art but no real focus to pursue it. He soon went along with his two older brothers to New York, however, enrolling at the Art Students League to take courses with Thomas Hart Benton. Benton was another American art force in the making who would lead the 1930s Regionalist Triumvirate, a trio which included Benton, Grant Wood of American Gothic fame, and John Steuart Curry.

Benton, Wood and Curry turned to the culture and landscape of the Midwest for subject matter, much of which was projected onto imposing, semi-epic murals. They sought to shift the focus of American art away from Eurocentric or even East Coast preferences, and to show how the everyday farm girl or preacher or working man were worthy of appreciation. As Benton himself declared, "The Great Plains have a releasing effect...I like their endlessness." Regionalist work was sometimes praised as exciting and organic, yet at other times the school was called reactionary or exaggerated. The swaggering Benton tended to be the most dynamic of the group, and his career would be marked with conflict against what he perceived to be the art elite.

While Tom Benton had a bit of a macho hothead reputation, he was often attentive and caring toward his students. In the case of the Pollock Brothers, all were readily welcomed by Benton and his Italian wife Rita, a support base which included free spaghetti dinners and an open door policy at the Benton's apartment. Jackson, in need of both paternal and artistic guidance, immediately bonded with Benton. In the classroom, Benton came across as a strong-willed yet perceptive instructor who stressed direct experience, hard work and the significance of composition and design in his teachings.

Benton's initial influence on the youngest Pollock was more emotional than immediate. Firstly and perhaps most importantly, Benton urged Jackson to think of himself as a serious artist and not just a floundering wannabe. Also, Benton's style had a unique muscle and energy that lent itself to the abstracted pulse of Pollock's later canvases of chaos.

Benton's earlier travels across the country inspired Pollock's own sojourn across Depression-era America, hitchhiking and taking odd jobs. Pollock posed for Benton as well, providing a lean and wiry figure for works like Ballad of the Jealous Lover of Lone Green Valley. There was clearly a father-son rapport between the pair, but despite calling him a "damned fool" for drowning his talent, Benton was never able to stop Pollock from drinking. Pollock also reportedly became too fond of earthy and free-spirited Rita Benton, brooding about how he wanted to marry her himself but how she would never leave Tom.

In 1935, Benton had had enough of New York and was ready to take a position at the Kansas City Art Institute. He and Rita headed west while Pollock moved into their apartment, although the place was never the same without the couple's vibrant presence. Pollock visited the Bentons in Missouri not long after, but by that point he was drinking so heavily that he had to enter a clinic and undergo professional treatment. Back in Manhattan, drying out slowly, Pollock began to drift away from Benton, explore Jungian therapy and ultimately took on his cooler and more cryptic "Jack the Dripper" identity.

By the mid-1940s, Pollock was married to Lee Krasner and had become a burgeoning force on the art scene. Benton, on the other hand, was considered to be a Regionalist throwback, relegated to the Midwest and no longer nationally prominent. Benton had been on the cover of Time in 1934; by 1947 Pollock was heralded by the same magazine as "the most powerful painter in America." Still, while it seems likely that Benton would have followed the same life path without ever meeting Jackson, without Benton, America might not have boasted of that same powerful Pollock as one of its own.

Upon hearing of Pollock's fatal car crash in 1956, Benton was deeply saddened-too much so to even attend Pollock's funeral. Willem de Kooning made a special trip to Benton's summer home in Martha's Vineyard to tell Benton in person, and the Bentons then showed De Kooning how Rita had saved all of Pollock's many press clippings. Pollock had also kept in touch with Benton, generally when he was depressed or had gotten particularly drunk and reminiscent--and no matter what the hour or how inebriated the conversation, it seemed that Benton was always willing to pick up the phone.

Sources
 
Tom and Jack: The Intertwined Lives of Thomas Hart Benton and Jackson Pollock -- Henry Adams (Bloomsbury Press, 2009)

American Visions: The Epic History of Art In America -- Robert Hughes (Knopf Publishing, 1999)

henri celebration

Today in 1869 the great Henri Matisse was born in northern France, although later in life he would seek out the distinct light and color of the southern part of the country.  He eventually became a master of color and deceptively simple form and shape, and if you do enjoy his work it can have a curiously both enlivening and calming effect.

I discover the quality of colors in a purely instinctive way. -- Henri Matisse (1869 - 1954)

Pictured by Henri Matisse:  Interior with Goldfish Bowl (1914); The Music Lesson (1917); Conversation Under the Olive Trees (1921); Self-Portrait (circa 1900)

the quiet world of gustave

 It's been noted here before that today was the birthday of artist Gustave Caillebotte (b. August 19, 1848 - d. 1894), and how Caillebotte was part of the French Impressionist circle and is probably best-known for the damp umbrellas and cobblestones of his 1877 masterpiece Paris Street, Rainy Day.  Caillebotte also liked to garden and had a strong interest in photography -- both pursuits that influenced his artwork -- and he had a keen eye for unusual perspectives or subject matter that made his paintings more intriguing.

 

Pictured:  The Orange Trees (1878), White and Yellow Chrysanthemums, Garden at Petit Gennevilliers (1893), Fruit Displayed on a Stand (1881/82), Garlic Cloves and Knife on the Corner of a Table (1870s), Laundry Drying (1892)

frida and salma

July 6th was the birthday of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo (July 6, 1907 - July 13. 1954), whose unique talent and celebrated yet troubled life became the subject of the 2002 biopic Frida.  Directed by Julie Taymor and starring Salma Hayek as Kahlo, Frida won two Academy Awards and was generally praised by critics -- particularly for Hayek's interpretation of Kahlo's complex character.  This month's American Airlines' Spanish language magazine Nexos has a spotlight piece on Salma Hayek, in which she reflects upon Frida Kahlo and how though the artist wasn't a conventional beauty, she was nonetheless charismatically and singularly beautiful.  That despite her being an invalid and having what might be perceived as less than perfect features ("tenía una ceja" or a unibrow, and "un poco de bigote" or a bit of a moustache), she was confident and brave and always her own person.  She also embraced her cultural heritage proudly in her personal style and in her vivid paintings. "Como ella no hay dos," Salma concludes. "Y para mí siempre fue hermosa."

I used to think I was the strangest person in the world but then I thought 

there are so many people in the world, there must be someone
just like me who feels bizarre and flawed in the same ways I do.  
-- Frida Kahlo

*********

Pictured:  Frida Kahlo; Salma Hayek in Frida; and The Two Fridas -- Frida Kahlo, 1939

artist birthday

Today was once the birthday of British artist John Linnell (June 16, 1792 - 1882), known for his portrait work and landscape painting.  Linnell studied with Benjamin West and John Varley and entered the Royal Academy at the impressive age of just thirteen.  Linnell was also a friend and patron of William Blake, and unlike more conservative artists was supportive of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood when they first came upon the scene.  His career was prolific and successful, and he was additionally prolific as the father of nine children.

Pictured:  John Linnell -- Self Portrait (1860); St. John the Baptist (1867); A River Landscape, Sunset; Lady Torrens and Her Family (1820); William Blake Portrait (1825).  

All images from Wikimedia Commons

born today

Daniel Koerner -- November 16, 1909 - 1977

Pictured:  West Side Ramp -- circa 1935 (Smithsonian American Art Museum)

will he was

Today brings the 450th birthday of William Shakespeare, or rather the day that Shakespeare's birthday is celebrated.  Actual birth records weren't always clear back then, but since Shakespeare was baptized around this time and died on April 23rd, the same date is used to mark his birth.  Nonetheless, Shakespeare was of course a poet, iconic playwright, perhaps a Taurus, and the man responsible for keeping generations of actors busy portraying characters in his major works, as well as portraying Shakespeare himself.   (Most of the actors have been British but then again, Shakespeare was a fellow Englishman.)

Shakespeare's plays have also inspired artists to paint scenes from his plays, several of which are featured below.  And personally my favorite Shakespearean passage is from Macbeth and found to be nightly true:  "Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleave of care. The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath. Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course, Chief nourisher in life's feast."

Pictured after Shakespeare:  Portia by John Everett Millais, 1886; The First Madness of Ophelia by D.G. Rossetti, 1864; Othello and Desdemona by Antonio Muñoz Degraín, 1880; and Miranda - The Tempest by John William Waterhouse, 1916

all in the family

 

Today would have been the birthday of Irish artist John Butler Yeats (1839-1922), who with his wife Susan brought to life six children, one of whom just happened to be poet William Butler Yeats and another the painter Jack B. Yeats.  The passion and words of William Butler Yeats sparked the Irish Literary Revival, and W.B. Yeats also was the first Irishman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923.  Jack B. Yeats developed a distinct artistic style during his long career while remaining strongly attached to his native Ireland.  John Butler Yeats' daughters Lily and Lolly were creative forces as well, Lily for needlework and textiles, and Lolly for art education, bookbinding and printing.  So without accusations of bosh or blarney, it can be claimed that the Yeats family truly did have quite an impact on Ireland's cultural heritage.

That said, a Happy Saint Patrick's Day to all....

I made my song a coat
Covered with embroideries
Out of old mythologies
From heel to throat;
But the fools caught it,
Wore it in the world’s eyes
As though they’d wrought it.
Song, let them take it,
For there’s more enterprise
In walking naked.

William Butler Yeats, "The Coat" (1914)

Pictured:  Portrait of William Butler Yeats -- John Butler Yeats, 1900 and The Swinford Funeral -- Jack B. Yeats, 1918 (The Walters Art Museum)

the queen's many faces

From its very beginning on November 2, 1755, the life of Queen Marie Antoinette was destined to become the stuff of history and legend, novel and film.  She grew up in the center of royalty, was married at age fourteen as part of a royal alliance, produced royal heirs and went about living as she had been raised -- as a royal entity.  Her 1793 execution by guillotine came as the result of revolutionary fervor, a people's rebellion fueled by contempt for monarchies and social injustice.  She was reportedly not as indifferent to the plight of her subjects as rumor would have it, and it's unlikely that she ever made any glib suggestions that peasants go eat cake or even brioche.

Still, she was high-spirited and undeniably caught up in court society, her style and beauty at first delighting the French people, then turning against her amid accusations of adultery and extravagance.  And along the way there were numerous portraits painted of Marie Antoinette as Dauphine and then Queen, notably by artist Élisabeth Vigée Lebrun as the official royal portrait painter until 1789.  Lebrun went into exile after the royal family was put under house arrest by the Garde Nationale, and Polish-born Alexandre Kucharski became the official portraitist instead.  One might think that by that point there would be no more royal portraits, but Kucharski did produce some paintings of Marie Antoinette in her last years, works rather different from Lebrun's sumptuous depictions.  The Widow Capet's final days and death came with as much dignity as she could muster, though she was said to be also quite ill with other physical ailments -- a state suggested by the Sophie Prieur portrait modeled from a Kucharski painting.  Though some were bayoneted by protestors in the heat of violence, most portraits of Queen Marie Antoinette survived the Revolution; Marie Antoinette herself, of course, did not. 


Pictured:
Queen Marie Antoinette of France -- Élisabeth Vigée Lebrun,1778
Marie Antoinette in a Muslin Dress --  Élisabeth Vigée Lebrun, 1783
Marie Antoinette with Her Children -- Élisabeth Vigée Lebrun, 1787
Marie Antoinette -- Alexandre Kucharski, ca. 1791
Queen Marie Antoinette of France in the Prison Temple, ca. 1793 -- Sophie Prieur (after Kucharski)

random artist's birthday: william dyce

Born today in Aberdeen was 19th century Scottish painter William Dyce (September 19, 1806 - 1864).  Dyce studied at the Royal Academy and then in Rome for nine months, and he would become highly influential in arts education later in his career.  Many of his works involve religious subject matter and Pre-Raphaelite inclinations, but his scenes of daily life are also quite distinctive.  Said to be "as keen in speech as in visage," Dyce died while in the midst of an exhaustive project of frescoes at Westminster Palace.  The series involved the Legend of King Arthur and was never finished. 

Pictured:  The Garden of Gethsemane -- William Dyce, 1860 (National Museums Liverpool) and Welsh Landscape with Two Women Knitting -- William Dyce, 1864 (National Museum Cardiff)

164 years of caillebotte

Gustave Caillebotte was born today in 1848 in Paris; his family was well-to-do and socially established, and before fully focusing on art, Caillebotte studied engineering and law.  He was part of the French Impressionist circle and not only bankrolled exhibits of their work but helped keep some of his comrades afloat -- particularly Monet.  Still, Caillebotte's paintings aren't really as impressionistic as those of the others and have more of a defined and often distinct perspective.  Caillebotte's 1877 Paris Street, Rainy Day is perhaps his best-known effort and now a focal point of the Chicago Art Institute's collection, but there are many other great Caillebotte paintings, a few of which are pictured here.  Caillebotte died far too young from pulmonary problems at the age of 45, and his far-sighted generosity continued on after his death with the placement of his fellow Impressionists' works at the Luxembourg and The Barnes Foundation. 


Pictured Caillebotte paintings:  On the Pont de l'Europe, circa 1877 (Kimbell Art Museum); Sunflowers on the Banks of the Seine, 1886 (the-athenaeum.org); Fruit Displayed on a Stand, circa 1881 (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

northside algren

Chicago author Nelson Algren would have marked a 103rd birthday today, if he hadn't left our sphere in 1981 after suffering a heart attack. Though Algren was born in Detroit, his family moved to Chicago when he was a child and he would be emotionally and artistically linked with the city for the rest of his life. He did abandon Chicago for the East Coast in his later years, feeling that he wasn’t appreciated by his hometown despite the fame he had achieved through publication of such novels as The Man with the Golden Arm and Never Come Morning.  Apparently at the time he left you could barely find his books in the Chicago Public Library, though they are certainly there now.

Algren was streetwise yet poetic, turning blighted urban views into hauntingly beautiful scenes. He could also peer into the soul of a desperate man or woman and find a whole range of experiences and emotions -- and what had led them to turn to the needle or the bottle, or to a life of crime. He wasn’t much of a schmoozer and called things as he saw them, which often led to his disenfranchisement from the literati of his day. He had a long-time affair with French writer Simone de Beauvoir, but that ended with a bittersweet (generally more bitter than sweet) resentment, much like his departure from Chicago.

Reading Algren’s works is a great way to learn about the man and the Chicago neighborhood in which he found his writing “zone,” the then-predominantly Polish area called The Triangle. Algren probably wouldn’t recognize much of his gentrified, hipped-up Triangle now, but a fine way to go back in time beyond reading Algren’s fiction is to check out Call Northside 777, a film based on the real case of a Chicago man imprisoned for a murder he didn’t commit. It has an unusually low-key tone for a 1948 movie, with Jimmy Stewart playing a reporter unraveling errors of justice. Stewart's quest leads him to the Polish corners of the South side, but Call Northside 777 also hits the titled North side as well, offering a cinematic window into some of the bars, streets, and people of the Triangle area and truly bringing Algren’s words to life.

the individualist

Author and philosopher Ayn Rand was born today in 1905 and died in 1982 at the age of 77. Her perhaps best known work is the architectural epic The Fountainhead, which follows the career of the intense and uncompromising Howard Roark along with many other less idealistic yet occasionally more intriguing side characters. This uncompromising cat enjoys idling by the novel for some reason and tries her best to shred its 695 pages. She may be identifying with The Fountainhead's (anti)heroine Dominique Francon -- and like Dominique is also willful, beautiful, and gets a twisted pleasure out of destroying things.

once upon a kandinsky birthday

The artist must train not only his eye, but his soul.

(Wassily Kandinsky, December 4, 1863* -- December 13, 1944)

*December 16 is also noted as Kandinsky's birthday, apparently depending on whether you use the Julian or Gregorian calendar.

Pictured: Yellow-Red-Blue -- W. Kandinsky, 1925 (Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou)

the mystery guest

Born May 11, 1904 (d. 1989), Surrealist Salvador Dalí knew how to market himself and his work and was never too reticent or aloof to miss a worthwhile opportunity to get his wild eyes and curious mustache out there. He seemed to really love the spectacle and drama part of being an artist, and if he were still with us he’d no doubt be delighted to learn that you can find his 1950s What's My Line? appearance on YouTube, along with a few other interesting Dalí TV moments. You can see in the What’s My Line? clip how Dalí easily maintains his somewhat perplexed poise throughout the questioning, then how he’s sure to suavely kiss the hands of all the women on the panel as he goes over to introduce himself.

vincent and gregor

Today was once the birthday of Vincent van Gogh, an artist of great emotion and intense colors -- and an unfortunately tragic ending. And an unfortunately never-ending association with the loss of an earlobe, but that's just how the world turns. Van Gogh has been played by various actors, most famously by Kirk Douglas in Lust for Life, but which actor has taken on the role of both Vincent and Gregor Samsa, Kafka's hapless man-turned-beetle in The Metamorphosis? Whoever sends in the first correct e-mail answer (see profile link for address) will win a free GPSmyCity iPhone app for walking tours of either Chicago, London or Paris (be sure to specify which city you'd like when you send your reply).

Pictured: The Bedroom -- Vincent van Gogh, 1889 (Art Institute of Chicago) and Self-Portrait -- Vincent van Gogh, 1887

born today

...on March 24th, 1834 was William Morris, long-reigning Knight of the Arts & Crafts Round Table -- a table which he most surely would have designed. Known as Topsy to his Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood friends, Morris was a writer, poet, Socialist and genius of organic form and function whose beautiful textiles, tapestries, wallpapers, furniture, stained glass and printworks attest to his claim that the “true secret of happiness lies in taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life.” He also produced literary translations, including major sagas in Icelandic, though I doubt that the word "idle" (in any language) was ever part of the personal vocabulary of this remarkable creative dynamo.

Pictured: William Morris (1834-1896)