tagged w/ American Art
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The great American artist Edward Hopper captured urban and rural American. HIs images are now among the most enduring and popular images of the 20th century. His paintings were contemporary with the emergence of 'film noir' and, interestingly, both capture an edgy side of American cultture. Hopper would have denied this, having said once that he had no other goal but that of capturing the effect of light on the side of a building.
Some of the buildings he captured still stand in New York. One of them was the setting of his most iconic image: Night Hawks.The great American artist Edward Hopper captured urban and rural American. HIs images... more
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The American painter, Edward Hopper, is among the few artists who truly captured the soul of an era. HIs paintings --of lonely lighthouses, nude women staring into space from nearly empty rooms, brick store fronts the color of dried blood --capture, as few other artists have captured, both the spirit and the alienation of an age.
It could be a still-frame from an Alfred Hitchcock movie –a stately lighthouse towering above eye level. Were not the blues so beautiful and rich it would be bleak. A window lit interior would be reminiscent of Vermeer but for the missing tapestries. There are no virginals, no Sixteenth Century maps. Just a young woman staring blankly out the open window at nothing at all.
Hopper's most famous painting is Night Hawks of 1942 --a depiction of three people together, at night, but alone in a near empty diner in Greenwich Village in the wee, small hours of a morning. It's American "film noir" set against an imagined sound track, perhaps a sax.
A parody of this painting is almost as famous as the original. In it, the diner is peopled by Marilyn Monroe, James Dean and Humphrey Bogart. If the street outside is not wet, it should be and will be, soon; if not tonight, some night! Hopper is relevant today in the same way as is Casablanca --also a product of the war year 1942. Both capture the frustration of people alone in an uncaring world. As Rick might have put it then or now, the problems of two people don't amount to a hill of beans in a crazy, mixed-up world, nor our world on the brink of WWIII, another great depression, a police state.
Hopper himself claimed no such intention. His purpose --he says --was merely to capture the play of light and shade. He wrote: "The picture is an attempt to paint sunlight as white, with almost or no yellow pigment in the white. Any psychologic [Sic] idea will have to be supplied by the viewer."
Hopper never intended to develop an “American” style but did so in spite of himself. His goal was more modest. 'All I really want to do is paint light on the side of a house.'"
He succeeded admirably. His "House by the Railroad" of 1925, is a study of sunlight on the side of a house, to be sure, and much more besides. For a younger generation, it was the Bates Motel. We are curious but not enough to want to go inside. Like his silent, lonely human observers, the façade stares back at you!
In 1951, Hopper returned to the open window theme. This time he left out the staring woman. We are left with an open window to an open, flat sea.
Stare at a Hopper long enough and you will find yourself in Hopper’s universe beside the young woman staring out the open window, among anonymous souls together but alone in a diner, beside like the stately lighthouse regarding a vast but empty ocean. It was Friedrich Nietzche who said that if you stare into the abyss long enough, it will stare back at you. Is that what it means to be alone? The American painter, Edward Hopper, is among the few artists who truly captured the... more
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Unity Mural is a series of paintings of Woman Spirit and Man Spirit figures in the center of a circle that span the spectrum of divine energies embodied in jewel colored multi-layered and multi-media art by American Artist Charleen Touchette. Beginning with a life-size charcoal body print made in 1974 and 1975 in New York, Touchette's new paintings in 2007 and 2008 made in Santa Fe explore the multi-colored palette of human and spiritual manifestations. This series is current and ongoing and more paintings will be posted soon.
Click link to see slide show of Unity Mural.
http://flickr.com/photos/touchart/sets/72157604222281067/show/
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from TouchArt.net and OneEarthBlog.blogspot.com
Unity Mural is a series of paintings of Woman Spirit and Man Spirit figures in the... more
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American artist Charleen Touchette created this powerful larger than life size charcoal "Womanspirit" in 1974-75 in New York, The evocative image led to Touchette's current series of Womanspirit and Manspirit art.American artist Charleen Touchette created this powerful larger than life size... more
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Clarity of Touchette's art indicts George W. Bush for Crimes against Humanity.
American Artist and mother of four, Charleen Touchette wrote, "How can I tell my children the U.S. doesn't torture when they see pictures everyday of our soldiers forced to do unspeakable things to other human beings."
"I feel like the good Germans who stood by helpless while Hitler used their tax money in an imperialistic unprovoked war to torture and murder people. Over 53% of our tax dollars go for war and destruction. How can this be Christian?"Clarity of Touchette's art indicts George W. Bush for Crimes against Humanity.... more
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