Janet Dawson: Archibald Prize Winner

Janet Dawson - Michael Goddy Reading - 1973 - Acrylic on Bleached Linen - 150 x 120 cm - Art Gallery NSW - Sydney, AustraliaAustralian artist Janet Dawson (born 1935) studied at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School in Melbourne from 1952 to 1956.In 1959 Janet Dawson won the lithography prize at the Slade School of Fine Arts, London University. She had enrolled there in 1956 at the age of 21 after winning the National Gallery of Victoria Traveling Scholarship. The brashness of the contemporary art scene in London was in direct contrast to Dawson's traditional art school background. Overwhelmed, she opted to learn lithography, and her love of drawing meant there was an instant empathy with this gentle graphic medium.

She traveled to Italy where she lived and worked for some months—and abstract art began to permeate her work. At the end of 1960, Dawson returned to Melbourne and established The Gallery A Print Workshop.

In 1973, Dawson won the Archibald Prize with the piece entitled Michael Goddy Reading (a portrait of her husband, the actor and playwright Michael Boddy).

Alma Thomas: A Concentration on Beauty and Happiness

Alma Thomas - Atmospheric Effects I - 1970 - Acrylics and Pencil on Paper - 22 1/8 x 30 3/8 in. - Smithsonian American Art Museum - Washington D.C. (click photo for larger image)African-American Abstract Expressionist Alma Thomas (c. 1891-1976) was the first graduate of Howard University’s art department (in 1924). Though she’d always had dreams of becoming an architect—after college she began a 35-year career teaching in a Washington, D.C. junior high school. With the income she supported herself and her art.

Although Thomas earlier works were representational and realistic, she eventually developed her signature style in her 70s—large, abstract paintings filled with dense, irregular patterns of bright colors.

Thomas became an important role model for women, for African Americans, and for older artists. She was the first African American woman to have a solo exhibition at New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art, and she exhibited her paintings at the White House three times.

“Through color, I have sought to concentrate on beauty and happiness, rather than on man's inhumanity to man.” - Alma Thomas

Peggy Guggenheim: A Major Force in the Art World

Peggy Guggenheim and Jackson Pollock in front of Mural (1943), CA. 1946, (Courtesy of guggenheim.org) (click photo for larger image)Socialite Peggy Guggenheim (1897-1979) was born into the wealthy Guggenheim family of New York City. The niece of Solomon R. Guggenheim, who founded New York’s Guggenheim Museum, she rose to prominence as an important collector of art. In 1912, when she turned 21, Peggy inherited $2.5 million (valued at $35.3 million today) and moved to Paris, where she befriended Man Ray, Constantin Brancusi, and Marcel Duchamp.

In 1938, she established a modern art gallery in London and began seriously collecting art, focusing on Surrealist and abstract art. Through Duchamp, she created many connections in the art world and exhibited works by important modernists like Henry Moore, Alexander Calder, Pablo Picasso, Jean Arp, and Max Ernst. After one year, she decided to shut the gallery and focus her efforts on creating a museum.

Peggy settled in Venice in 1949 and established the Peggy Guggenheim Collection to showcase her impressive collection of modern art. Today, it is still one of the biggest attractions in Venice and highlights Cubism, Surrealism, and Abstract Expressionism by both European and American artists.

In the summer of 1943, she commissioned a young and relatively unknown Jackson Pollock to paint a mural for her Manhattan townhouse. The work he produce (Mural) turned out to be his first large painting, and the largest work he would ever create.

Learn more about Peggy Guggenheim at Jill Kiefer’s presentation, TOMORROW—March 9th, at the Bethany Arts Community (at 4:00 PM). Admission is FREE! Search for more info about the artists mentioned here on What About Art?

Pino Pascali: Arte Povera

Pino Pascali - Bridge - 1968 - Steel wool and wire - 39 3/8" x 26' 3" x 35 7/16" (800 x 100 x 90 cm) - MoMA, New York (click photo for larger image)Arte Povera (Italian for "Impoverished Art" or "Poor Art”) was is label for a small group of artists in Italy who were experimenting with nontraditional and politically charged art, in the 1960s and 1970s.

These artists created and explored modes of expression such as ephemeral art, performance art, installation art and assemblage, using what have been referred to as “poor” non-art materials. These techniques have since become extremely common tools in contemporary art; in fact this is one of the reasons that such a small and short-lived movement continues to have such relevance today.

One of the clearest influences on the group was the work of Dada artist Marcel Duchamp (discussed elsewhere on What About Art?). His "Readymade" sculptures, especially his infamous "Fountain" urinal, have the same kind of subversive power that Arte Povera artists aimed to achieve.

Pino Pascali (1935-1968) was part of the Arte Povera movement. He used everyday, natural, and unorthodox materials in his work, including cans, steel wool, hay, and dirt. His "fake sculptures" appear to be solid structures but are actually shaped canvases whose forms suggest animals, plants, and landscapes. 

The work featured here, Bridge, has the appearance of a primitive rope bridge. But it is constructed of steel wool, a modern industrial product. This is the most ambitious of the works in Pascali's last series, entitled Reconstructions of Nature. "I do not believe you make shows in galleries," Pascali said, "you make the gallery, you create the space."

Pascali is also known for his Weapons series, re-creations of guns and cannons assembled from found materials and painted army green. His inspired works were an important contribution to postwar art within his short lifetime.

Allan Rohan Crite: Artist-Reporter

Allan Rohan Crite, Sunlight and Shadow, 1941, oil on board, 25 1/4 x 39 in. (64.2 x 99.1 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C. (click photo for larger image)Born in North Plainfield, New Jersey, Allan Rohan Crite (1910-2007) moved with his family to the Boston area, at an early age. During the course of his long life, Crite enjoyed an extensive career as a painter, draftsman, printmaker, author, librarian, and publisher.

Although he’s often labeled a Harlem Renaissance artist, Crite’s lifelong objective was to depict the life of African-Americans living in Boston as ordinary citizens of the middle class, rather than the stereotypical jazz musicians or sharecroppers featured in many other Harlem Renaissance works. Through his art, Crite intended to tell the story of African Americans as part of the fabric of American mainstream society and its reality. By using a more representational style, rather than an ultra-modern approach, Crite felt that he could more adequately "report" what he saw. He described himself as an “artist-reporter” noting that, “I've only done one piece of work in my whole life and I am still at it. I wanted to paint people of color as normal humans. I tell the story of man through the black figure.^”

Crite’s full body of work can be categorized into three basic themes: Negro spirituals; religious themes that emphasize non-European aspects of the Bible; and, general African American experiences. Crite also contributed to the African American art scene in Boston by creating the Artist’s Collective, a forum for emerging African American artists.

In the work featured here, three generations of neighbors gather in Madison Park, located in Boston's South End, to spend a pleasant afternoon beneath the shady trees.