Wassily Kandinsky

Autumn in Murnau, 1908

o/p

 32.3 x 40.9 cm

Wassily Kandinsky

"THE ARTIST’S LIFE IS NOT ONE OF PLEASURE. HE MUST NOT LIVE IRRESPONSIBLY; HE HAS DIFFICULT WORK TO PERFORM, ONE WHICH OFTEN PROVES A CROWN OF THORNS. HE MUST REALIZE THAT HIS ACTS, FEELINGS, AND THOUGHTS ARE THE UNDEFINABLE BUT FUNDAMENTAL MATERIAL FROM WHICH HIS WORK IS CREATED; HE IS FREE IN ART, BUT NOT IN LIFE."  Kandinsky.

I think Kandinsky was so busy making the new painting that he rarely made the best.   But, his goal was not to please me, that's for sure.  Kandinsky, in his book Concerning the Spiritual in Art, 1911, theorized a periodic pyramid of the new in art. The main idea is that the vanguard of art, or the top of the pyramid, will be occupied in any given era by a precious few works that are ahead of their time.  A very lonesome place is Kandinsky's summit, as by definition, no one else will appreciate or understand your work.

I find a few of his works do please me, and it is a good thing to study his take on Modernism and Abstraction.  He was certainly a trend-setter and worthy of his star in art history.

Kandinsky at Wikipedia.

Wassily Kandinsky, 1866 - 1944 - friendsofart.net.
Tumblr blog dedicated to the man. Very nice resource.
Online University - extensive article and links.
Project Gutenberg - Concerning The Spiritual In Art. (I read mine via Kindle, which I do enjoy better than the PC screen.)

Kandinsky.  Always Thinking.

Golden Gate

Dog, detail #4

@ 4x16

Pastel

Casey Klahn

News:

The Denver Workshop, May 19th & 20th, has one more space available at this time.  Many thanks to Ken Elliot, who is now blogging, for his encouragement and help putting this one together!

Also, my Portland friend and artist, Sarah Peroutka, is blogging.

Ken Elliot/For the Color.

Sarah Peroutka Studio.

Fractal Abstractal

Dog, detail #2

@16" x 12"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Blogger Sam says that dog's see a different color than you and I.

Abstraction Fraction

Dog, detail #1

@8" x 15"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

I found an old full-sheet abstract work in the bottom of a flat file drawer, and I am enthused about it!  I started playing around with the photo of it on Photoshop, and then decided that cutting it up into pieces would provide better stability within each individual part.  It is a decent pastel as is, but can be more fun broken apart and readdressed. Will I add more marks, or leave each piece as is?  Another possibility might be to run a single print, and then see what the pieces might yield.

What are your thoughts?

Emily Mason

Emily Mason: The Fifth Element
David Ebony

The American abstractionist, Emily Mason, uses color the way it ought to be used: with gusto! If your coloristic spirits are lagging, go see her work for inspiration.

I read an interview where she says she thrives on spontaneity, and do-overs deaden pictures for her. I relate to that, and it's nice to hear commiseration of this experience.

Emily Mason Paints with an Instinct for Color.

Three Generations of Abstract Painting: Alice Trumbull Mason, Emily Mason, & Cecily Kahn

Riposte -Repost

I am making a fine recovery from my operation on Tuesday. It will be a while before I am 100%, as my medical professional wife and I agree, it would be hard to find a more painful operation to have done. Meanwhile, enjoy a re-posting of this Barn subject essay.

Anthology of American Literature, McMichael.

Elijah Shifrin at Art & Critique has written about my barn and rural building subjects in his article, "Casey Klahn: Barns And The Abstract Wizard Of Washington".

Elijah is thoughtfully focused on the abstract qualities of my building paintings. I have carefully tried to avoid being cast as "the barn guy". The reason is that sentiment is so easily attached to this great American symbol, and yet sentiment is bygone content in contemporary art. The challenge has been to de-construct this awe inspiring structure and make it relevant for today's art.

My Barn
Photo: Lorie Klahn

Working against my efforts to keep the barn image down have been a number of forces. Sales, believe it or not, has been a force tugging at my shirt tail. The popularity of this theme and image, the American Gambrel barn, has been so high that sales of anything barn related are a fairly easy turn. The great thematic content that is associated with the barn is reflected by the book cover that has my Red Barn with Ramp image on it: An Anthology of American Literature, by McMichael. Another force is the fact that I live out here in the rural landscape where every farm has a big barn.

Barn Sketch
Pencil
Casey Klahn

Here in Davenport, WA, the barn isn't just American myth writ large, but an actual part of our lives. To be sure, the way of life is changing. The Heath family pioneered this farm at a spot about five minutes walk down canyon from my house. When the internal combustion engine started to replace livestock for locomotion, the farmers were able to build their houses and outbuildings uphill and farther from spring water sources. My family are the third owners of this farm, and the agricultural roots are gradually being eclipsed for a number of reasons. How wonderful for us to not see another house from ours!

Violet Oil Drum
7.5" x 10.5"
Soft Pastel
Casey Klahn

I'm heartened that Elijah has seen the abstract elements that are key to these building paintings. Shapes, colors and position are the content, more than the buildings themselves. Don't get me wrong. I'm as much a sucker for the deep meaning of the American barn as the next guy. My father built a barn once upon a time. And, the building in my iconic painting is my own barn.

Thumbnail of Barn
Pastel
Casey Klahn

The architect who designed the Gambrel barn was a flat out genius. The way the barn structure occupies the open land in rural America is stunning in scope and even vision. My barn, which is no longer used for any working good, occupies a side hill and commands a territorial view. I have some pride in owning it, but the Great Horned Owl that frequents it seems to have a bigger claim by virtue of time spent there.

Behind the Garage
Graphite on Sketch Paper
7" x 8.5"
Casey Klahn

Wolf Kahn uses the barn image a great deal in his work. He has taken it down to the pictorial elements with content that describes the position of the building on a slope or prominence, and elements like through-looking doors and windows, and severe value gradients.

The Heins' Farm
7.5" 15"
Casey Klahn
Private Collection

The story of my Red Barn with Ramp image I have told many times. I received a box of twelve "Wolf Kahn" Terrage pastels made by Diane Townsend, and in a first moment of inspiration I made a very small thumbnail sketch with the colors. It was the barn image just as it is seen on the book cover, except that sketch was about 1 inch square. I was in the moment, entranced by pure color and by the tactile qualities of the big, thick pastel sticks. Abstract shapes were the tools, and color was the content.

Elijah has written a good back story to the barn and building themes. The literary link to The Wizard of Oz is apt. The elemental truth of my surroundings is hard to contradict. Wind, sun, sky and agriculture. Can an artist overcome his environment long enough to forge content that aspires to higher art? I suggest not thinking too hard, but letting the hand and eye draw intuitively. Maybe that's the only way.

Barn Free

Anthology of American Literature, McMichael.

Elijah Shifrin at Art & Critique has written about my barn and rural building subjects in his article, "Casey Klahn: Barns And The Abstract Wizard Of Washington".

Elijah is thoughtfully focused on the abstract qualities of my building paintings. I have carefully tried to avoid being cast as "the barn guy". The reason is that sentiment is so easily attached to this great American symbol, and yet sentiment is bygone content in contemporary art. The challenge has been to de-construct this awe inspiring structure and make it relevant for today's art.

My Barn
Photo: Lorie Klahn

Working against my efforts to keep the barn image down have been a number of forces. Sales, believe it or not, has been a force tugging at my shirt tail. The popularity of this theme and image, the American Gambrel barn, has been so high that sales of anything barn related are a fairly easy turn. The great thematic content that is associated with the barn is reflected by the book cover that has my Red Barn with Ramp image on it: An Anthology of American Literature, by McMichael. Another force is the fact that I live out here in the rural landscape where every farm has a big barn.

Barn Sketch
Pencil
Casey Klahn

Here in Davenport, WA, the barn isn't just American myth writ large, but an actual part of our lives. To be sure, the way of life is changing. The Heath family pioneered this farm at a spot about five minutes walk down canyon from my house. When the internal combustion engine started to replace livestock for locomotion, the farmers were able to build their houses and outbuildings uphill and farther from spring water sources. My family are the third owners of this farm, and the agricultural roots are gradually being eclipsed for a number of reasons. How wonderful for us to not see another house from ours!

Violet Oil Drum
7.5" x 10.5"
Soft Pastel
Casey Klahn

I'm heartened that Elijah has seen the abstract elements that are key to these building paintings. Shapes, colors and position are the content, more than the buildings themselves. Don't get me wrong. I'm as much a sucker for the deep meaning of the American barn as the next guy. My father built a barn once upon a time. And, the building in my iconic painting is my own barn.

Thumbnail of Barn
Pastel
Casey Klahn

The architect who designed the Gambrel barn was a flat out genius. The way the barn structure occupies the open land in rural America is stunning in scope and even vision. My barn, which is no longer used for any working good, occupies a side hill and commands a territorial view. I have some pride in owning it, but the Great Horned Owl that frequents it seems to have a bigger claim by virtue of time spent there.

Behind the Garage
Graphite on Sketch Paper
7" x 8.5"
Casey Klahn

Wolf Kahn uses the barn image a great deal in his work. He has taken it down to the pictorial elements with content that describes the position of the building on a slope or prominence, and elements like through-looking doors and windows, and severe value gradients.

The Heins' Farm
7.5" 15"
Casey Klahn
Private Collection

The story of my Red Barn with Ramp image I have told many times. I received a box of twelve "Wolf Kahn" Terrage pastels made by Diane Townsend, and in a first moment of inspiration I made a very small thumbnail sketch with the colors. It was the barn image just as it is seen on the book cover, except that sketch was about 1 inch square. I was in the moment, entranced by pure color and by the tactile qualities of the big, thick pastel sticks. Abstract shapes were the tools, and color was the content.

Elijah has written a good back story to the barn and building themes. The literary link to The Wizard of Oz is apt. The elemental truth of my surroundings is hard to contradict. Wind, sun, sky and agriculture. Can an artist overcome his environment long enough to forge content that aspires to higher art? I suggest not thinking too hard, but letting the hand and eye draw intuitively. Maybe that's the only way.

If I Were Rothko

Untitled,
6.5" x 4"
Original Pastel
10 June 2007
Casey Klahn

The image above was part of my Rothko study earlier in the year.

This blog is getting hits at Google with this quote by me:

Does it serve the artist to know about color theory, or to hold an opinion about which theory he finds correct? I tend to think the answer is no. More on why I feel that way later.

Of course it serves to know color theory when mixing paint, or establishing a mood in an illustration or a narrative piece. Actually, the times when knowing the science of color serves the artist at his craft are numerous. But that's just it: craft. The mystical quality that floats the painting up into what we describe as fine art is where we part ways with the science of color.

How did the artist establish that setting or feeling in a particular work? Was it done with algorythms and juxtapositions? Did it emanate from his soul? For sure it had less to do with the science of color placement, and more to do with the heart.

That's my opinion on color theory.

Intuitive Choice in Art

Abstract Reds Over Blues
20" x 12"
Original Pastel
Casey Klahn
Collection the Artist

Things are a little "static" around here, to use the web lingo. Let's revisit a popular post that should grease the skids of creativity;

Intuitive Choices

Under the tutelage of Diane Townsend I painted this abstract work. It has some elements of color field painting, like Mark Rothko, and extensive gestural elements. The gestural nature is in keeping with the drawing roots of the pastel medium. I like the way the paper's surface is evident, and yet the color blending, and heavily worked nature of the piece makes it work as a painting for me.

Let's talk a little bit about intuitive choices in fine art. The choices that a child makes are very intuitive, because their knowledge base is limited. The hands start moving, and the limitations are the length of their little arms, and the characteristics of the tools. They are mostly trying these tools out for the very first time.

A great deal is made of technique in art. The pastel medium is no exception. In fact, technical skill is probably too emphasized in this medium. It's supposed to be hard, you see. And, admittedly, there is much to know (much that I do not know!). Sometimes beginning steps are not rewarded very well by the outcomes.

"Only when he no longer knows what he is doing does the painter do good things."
Edgar Degas said in a quote posted at Expo Degas.

So, intuition! First sketches with bold gestural marks always work better for me than deliberate and measured work. The thing is to have years and years of drawing from memory in one's back pocket, and then the quick marks made on the paper will seem intentional. I don't subscribe to the subtle and tentative working that is often required of detailed realistic work.

The same goes for compositional choices. It is not easy to describe, but I think that studying good composition is necessary, and then ought to be put out of one's mind. If you can internalize compositional knowledge, it will come out naturally as you draw. The best thing I can say is: "try it".

The ability to critique one's own art becomes more important when you want to be an intuition-driven artist. Did this one really turn out to have the best composition? Color Choices? Does it have too much to say for one painting? Ask these questions of yourself.

Wolf Kahn has a chair that he sits in and ruminates over his finished art. Most artists do take some time and distance away from their works to try and get an objective perspective on their own creations. It's challenging.

The pastel medium is "made to order" for the artist who wants to favor intuitive creation. It is a direct, and rewarding tool. It's interesting to consider that in the book, Wolf Kahn's Pastels, the great colorist chose to make the text a collection of essays on artistic process. A natural fit, I think.

New Links for the quoted post:

Diane Townsend.

Schama's take on art is somewhere between pointless and powerless, in my opinion. However, I offer you his link on Mark Rothko, here.

Rothko-ized

I have become Rothko-ized! Now, I am a fully functioning zombie in the Mark-Mode.

Just kidding. I will be "out of pocket", as the hip people say, for the next three weeks. On the road for Bellevue, Park City and Sun Valley. Reports will be posted at
the Endless Summer Art Fair.

You are owed a better end to the Rothko study. Sorry, I'm not ready for the definitive post, yet. I will have some down time between driving stretches, and maybe I'll get to post a little.

The quick things I can share are my pre-conclusions. Greenberg and that whole gang (including MR) were so impressed with abstraction being the break-out style for modern art that they felt they needed to push it to it's absolute limits. I'm not sure if we have reached those limits, yet. The cracks in that infrastructure developed before the Abstract Expressionist school could run its course.

I disagree with the dialectic that insists abstraction is the end-game of art. There are some solid values to abstraction, and it is fundamental to art as a historic continuum, and as a rudimentary part of the formal structure of art itself. I love the stuff, personally.

Rothko was a huge figure on the American landscape, whose color field art did a better job of breaking away from figuration than Pollock's art, IMHO. Not to compare too much, but the lack of line and the forwarding of the element of color are why I say MR is better. Action painting, as absolutely fantastic as it is, is still very dependent (Pollock's work) on the line.

Let's see. Now that I've dug this big hole, I guess I'll have a fine job ahead of me to fill in the rationales! I don't want to leave you with a comparison between JP and MR. That's too far off the mark for understanding the Abstract Expressionists.

Let's leave you with this awesome photo of The Irascibles, a group of artists otherwise known as the Abstract Expressionists, or the New York School. I wanted to photoshop myself in there as an interviewer, but I didn't want a lawsuit from the photographer. Perhaps you'll just have to imagine that part.

Image of the Abstract Expressionists known as The Irascibles.http://www.artlex.com/ArtLex/a/images/abstexp_irascibles_lg.jpeg
"The Irascibles" (photo by Nina Leen, 1950, for Life magazine) Front row, left to right: Theodore Stamos, Jimmy Ernst (son of Max Ernst), Barnett Newman, James Brooks, Mark Rothko. Middle row: Richard Pousette-Dart, William Baziotes, Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, Robert Motherwell, Bradley Walker Tomlin. Back row: Willem De Kooning, Adolph Gottlieb, Ad Reinhardt, and Hedda Sterne.

Note:
Want to know more about Hedda Sterne? Fascinating. She is the last surviving member of this famous photo.

Untitled: Red, Gray, Blue

Untitled: Red, Gray, Blue
8" x 5"
Original Pastel
July 1st, 2007
Casey Klahn

Remember we were talking (in my post: Color Field Painting) about Rothko and the Abstract Expressionist's desire to take their art to the final or ultimate expression of art. The critic Clement Greenberg was an influential voice for the art movement that would take abstraction to absolute and near-absolute expression.

The Encyclopedia Britannica offers some insight here into Greenberg's reasoning for going whole hog into abstraction:

The intellectual justification for his approach had been articulated a few years earlier in two essays published in Partisan Review. "The Avant Garde and Kitsch" (1939) was a manifesto in which Greenberg made a sharp distinction between "true culture" and "popular art." He asserted that quality in a work of art had nothing to do with contemporary social and political values. "Retiring from the public altogether," he wrote, "the avant-garde poet or artist sought to maintain the high level of his art by both narrowing it and raising it to the expression of an absolute…." This was necessary, he argued, because of the ways in which modern society had debased high art into kitsch. In "Towards a Newer Laocoon" (published in Partisan Reviewin [sic] 1940) Greenberg explained the necessity for avant-garde artists to break away from the traditional dominance of subject matter and place a new emphasis on form.

We're still emphasizing form, or formal qualities of art, today. I was talking with another artist the other day who takes after Andrew Wyeth, and he was extolling the abstract values in all styles of painting that succeed. My friend, Stan Miller, was saying that one of the great artist's patrons insists on hanging a large Wyeth upside down. The abstract composition is that good, even though it's a "realist" work.

Color Field Painting

Untitled: Red, Gray, Violet
5.5" x 4"
Original Pastel
June 20, 2007
Casey Klahn

This is one of my recent Rothko responses. I did another two this morning (photos are pending).

Let me share the following quote from our author:

"Art therefore is a generalization. The use of the plastic elements (editor: the artist's tools) to any other ends, which are most usually particularizations and descriptions of appearances, or which serve the stimulation of separate senses, are not in the category of art and must be classified in the category of the applied arts." Mark Rothko

Rothko indicates that abstraction is the ultimate end "type" of art, which is a main theme in Abstract Expressionism. Obviously, art has moved on from then (the Forties and Fifties through roughly the early Seventies), and artists are producing realist work again. We'll get into DeKooning later, who had to explain to his peerage why he went back to the figure instead of pure non-figurative abstraction. Link here to Wiki on abstraction, and here to ArtLex definition, which you must scroll or page to under the letter "a".

Anytime you say that "thus and such" is the last word on something, you get into trouble. I don't blame the AEs for looking for the ultimate definition of art, since the urge to be your best is what takes even artists to the top of their field. Certainly that happened for this group of American painters in the post-war years.

And, since they insisted on being "of the age", they did feel apocalyptic overtones to their time. Think: Atom Bomb. Pollock brought that up in a famous quote, and the times also were influenced by the overwhelming and then-present effects of the Second World War. Of course they needed an end-all art, since maybe they were in an end time.

But, when you get over the apocalyptic hump, you return to the studio and make some art. Will it be realist, or abstract? There are shades of each, and abstraction can be at the level of the idea, not just the subject or style of a painting. Today we live in a post-abstract world, where new things have to be created for art to flourish. Is there something new for abstractionists to say? I think so. What about realists. Of course there are new things to say!

William Lehman has a good brief on the whole mess at his post: Design VS Art.

Links:
http://www.artlex.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_art
http://www.artisthideout.com/design-vs-art/

Tagged Again!

The meme where bloggers are tagging each other to produce 7 factoids, and then tag 7 others, has come back around to me. I am opting not to play according to the rules, as I don't want to be a "double-dipper" in the well of tag mammon.

Tina Mammoser, London Artist, has tagged me this time. So, because I really like her blog site and her art, I will do a tag-back. Maybe that will become a new rule for this game: "If tagged a second time, the taggee may tag-back the tagger".

I introduce Tina Mammoser, who is an American ex-pat in London. Check out her wonderful web site as well.
She does contemporary abstracts in acrylic, which remind me of landscapes in the broader sense.

We are probably long lost cousins, I think. Her work involves water because she has always lived by the water. I get up-tight when I get too far from a body of water-something to do with growing on at the Pacific coast. She is exploring horizontals, while my own landscapes find interest in vertical elements. Can you tell I really love her work?

Teri Horton's "$5 Pollock"

There is a pretty hefty backlash that has accompanied the abstract movement. It's just a crock and a hoax - an elaborate promotional "smoke and mirrors" show, if you ask the detractors. What good is art that is about nothing?

The latest installment from the naysayers is the Teri Horton Five Dollar Pollock story. Her story is well covered in the news media, and it's a knee-slapper. Did the retired lady truck driver inadvertantly buy a forgotten Jackson Pollock painting? She found the big canvas at a thrift store, and bought it for her friend as a joke for 5 bucks. An art professor from the local college gave her the clue that it might be a Jackson Pollock, and her retort is classic: "Who the #@*^! is Jackson Pollock?"

So, here is our dear Teri, holding onto this (virtually worthless to her) painting that maybe could fetch up to $140,000,000 if she can just find the right sucker buyer for it. I am doubled over in laughter watching clips of this lady and a host of arts professionals tearing their hair out trying to make up establish a provenance for it.

Was there a fingerprint on the Five Dollar Pollock that corresponds to known Jackson Pollock fingerprints? Evidence from his Long Island studio, and from a JP in the Tate museum apparently match. But, the hard-headed and harder-hearted arts experts disagree. Fingerprints don't mean anything to museum curators or art appraisers that have seen the painting.

This woman is trailer trash, basically, to the snobby snobs of the art world, and the ghost of JP himself could appear to them and say: "It's mine!" and they still wouldn't buy it from the likes of Teri Horton. Take it as an article of faith - you can't trade with the high brows if you don't smell like money already. That's the message of the story Horton is putting forth, anyway.

If a Pollock really could be purchased for $5, then what is the real intrinsic value of a big canvas covered with drips? If he were any good, why couldn't he just paint a figure, a faerie or a piece of fruit, like any other normal artist?

It all comes down to provenance, in my humble opinion. No signature on the work? Then, if the artist Jackson Pollock painted it, and didn't sign it, then he was devaluing it, himself. Then, he failed to destroy it, which is the accepted norm for artists. It seems that our Teri Horton was offered 9 Million dollars for the piece, but refused it as too little. Bad move.

Artists today have powerful tools to establish a paper trail for their work: signature (DUH!), jpeg, date of creation, list of showings, commentary from first and third party sources, receipt of sale with value established, names of owners, etc. All these things are data that helps to tag that artwork down through history.

Teri's Five Dollar Pollock is a byproduct of the Antiques Roadshow era, where any schmuck can fall off a turnip wagon and come up smelling like a rose. Rags to riches, as it were. Don't be angry at the art world, Teri. Brush up on your pitch!

The bigger lesson is the commentary on modern art that this episode reveals. The rank and file don't like the art, don't care for the artists that much and really dislike the highbrow art world that surrounds this whole mess. But, I have found out that there is a similar current in society that doesn't like any art, abstract or real. The artist today, and the army of other people who make their livings from art, have a ways to go before they have the exalted place in society and civilization that they picture for themselves. Maybe one start may be to reach out to the Teri Hortons of the world, somehow. A little proof of value wouldn't hurt the artist any.

I liked what this commenter had to say regarding the Five Dollar Pollock and Horton's problems with it:

"Ultimately, it does not matter if the painting is a Pollock or not. The value of it is determined by what someone is willing to pay for it. There is no intrinsic value of any 'Art' piece. There is no MSRP in the art world. She was offered 2 million dollars for it, so that is what it is currently worth (if that offer even still stands). If she rejects that offer and /or it is rescinded, and there is no other offer, the painting is worth 5 dollars. plain (sic) and simple. This is economics 101. 'Art' is no exception."

Posted by pmfaricy on Sun, May 6, 2007 9:17 PM ET

Another Blogger's opinion:

http://www.bookofjoe.com/2006/11/what_teri_horto.html

Pollock Links & References

The Colorist
About The Colorist blog.

Galaxy, 1947
Jackson Pollock

Update May 28th., 2008: See also The Jackson Pollock Researcher for the comprehensive and current links on Jackson Pollock.

Originality was the hallmark of Jackson Pollock's art. He found a way to both connect with, and yet break free of whatever else had been happening with art. It's a little hard to appreciate the originality of Pollock from our high horse of retrospection. I liken it to some of my experiences with rock climbing. Sure, a particular rock climb will have a difficulty rating and a status as severe or hard, but when you go to climb it, you feel that it isn't as hard as described. Well, put yourself in the sticky shoes of the very first ascensionist. What was the experience like for him?

So, imagine the first "pure" abstraction. How does one completely eliminate the subject from a painting? The Abstract Expressionists often likened abstract painting to getting "in touch" with your inner child, because children draw and paint with freedom and innocence. I argued with that comparison until I had my own children picking up pencils and crayons. Now, I completely believe in the childlike aspects of abstract visual expression. Now, I just have to work out my objections to the "primitive man" comparisons to painting abstraction.

My own experience with abstraction took place when I took a workshop from Diane Townsend, who happens to be a great abstractionist with ties to New York and my hero Wolf Kahn.

How do you begin painting abstractly? Townsend unlocked that door for me, and before noon on the first day I was having a great time painting "nothing". I hope to continue my exploration of abstraction in the near future. It actually can be one of the hardest styles to paint in and make anything really good. My abstracts can be seen here and here.

Let's follow some link paths for Jackson Pollock.

Steven Naifeh and Greg Smith have written a Pulitzer prize winning biography titled: Jackson Pollock, An American Saga. I have some serious misgivings about it's historicity, but suffice it to say that it seems to be the "go to" book now for looking at his life. Ed Harris brings it to our attention in his comments about his movie about the keen artist.

Harris also thinks Pollock may have been manic-depressive. Of course, my first inclination would be to look up the paperwork on his 4-F status, just in case that might reveal something about a diagnosis of this or something similar. I guess he also saw therapists, and the records from that probably reveal something, too. Shades of van Gogh.

Pollock's Studio Floor

Don't miss the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center in East Hampton (Long Island). This small property with rustic facilities was purchased by Pollock and Krasner with help from Peggy Guggenheim, who was Pollock's "super-patron". It was here that Pollock began his drip paintings, and you may visit this museum and walk on the floor where his drips are preserved. Could these be considered accidents?

I recommend the Pollock bio written by the director of the P-K House, Helen Harrison.

There is a Pollock-Krasner Foundation, which I think is a very classy move by the late Lee Krasner, who was left as a widow by her drunken and cheating genius-artist husband. Trying to figure out what made Krasner's relationship with Pollock tick is an exercise in head-trips that some may enjoy. We'll look at the wonderful Krasner a little later in our Abstract Expressionist study this month.

The National Gallery of Art in DC has a good site about the old boy. A quick look at his process is seen in this GIF - Video. Here's a Quicktime featurette of a Hans Namuth film of the Camel-smoking curmudgeon at his task of working a horizontal canvas.

I have to limit the scope of JP references found at the Museum of Modern Art, since they are numerous. Man, this stuff is knee-deep. How does one have an "itinerant childhood"? Uh, never mind the MoMA for now...

Of course, my favorite site for Jackson Pollock is the fun and interactive "Create Your Own" Jackson Pollock by Milos Manetas. It's an ingenious flash page where you drip "paint" on your CRT screen. Of course, you don't control the color - those come as accidents. My only advice is cut loose, don't stay inside the frame, and don't stop too soon!

Links referenced above:
http://www.amazon.com/Jackson-Pollock-American-Steven-Naifeh/dp/0913391190
http://naples.cc.sunysb.edu/CAS/pkhouse.nsf
http://naples.cc.sunysb.edu/CAS/pkhouse.nsf/pages/pollock
http://www.pkf.org/
http://www.nga.gov/feature/pollock/index.htm
http://www.jacksonpollock.org/

Administrative note:
I would have liked to provide an image of my "Jackson Pollock" done on the flash simulator, but it looks like that is blocked. I also wished to place the videos directly in my post, but it's beyond my capabilities at this time. Do follow the links because seeing the painting style of JP in action is an eye opener.
Still Coming-my movie review of POLLOCK.

Which Artist Lives Here? Abstraction vs. Realism vs. Process - A Tag Team Battle

Ponte Vecchio - Old City

@7" x 6"
Graphite on 70gr. Sketch Paper
Casey Klahn

In the past, before I had this blog, I worked hard at unifying my work. My Colorist American Landscapes are a nicely coherent body of work, where abstracted landscapes reveal color stories that speak immediately to the viewer.

Now I have started posting both finished and process sketches, realist paintings (usually of Italy), realist farmscapes, and some abstracts. You may be asking yourself, "How many artists live here?"

I am not, as far as I know, Schizophrenic. In fact, I'll go out on a limb here, and assert that I am not. But, I do enjoy expanding my limits. Growing my artistic abilities, if you will. I have had an urge for some time to return to my realist roots. So, I started the 100 Paintings Project which stays focused on the Italian Landscape and realism, with effects of my colorist tilt. Then I put it on another blog, hopefully to reduce confusion between my styles and genres.

It's perfectly okay for Pablo Picasso to inhabit any number of genres. But not an unknown such as myself. BTW, I saw an awesome artist's tagline the other day : "So-and-so, the nation's favorite unknown artist". Anyway, my goal is to stay focused for both artistic and marketing reasons. At the art fairs, I am rigidly focused on one style for just those reasons. You have mere seconds to impress the passerby, and they don't want to be confused about how many artists are showing in that booth. Also, the fair committee takes a dim view of non-coherency.

But, here in blogger-land, I have become motivated by so many of my blogging chums and also by the famous artists that I research and oogle at on the web. So, first came some drawings. Then I fell totally off of the wagon and posted some of my abstracts, too.

Plus, I have gallerists looking in on me. They probably say, "this guy's not focused".

I am happy to be more inspired and ready for growth in my art. I want to return to figurative work, too. But, I am determined to always have a fine art body of work that stays unified. I make sure that I always have at least 40 framed pieces of these, as well. That way I can go to the art fairs and not run out, and I am ready to hang a gallery show at the same time. The probable solution for me is going to be to put up a static website that houses my Colorist American Landscapes, and keep this blog for process and broad subjects.

I am really pleased to have painted a new Colorist American Landscape around the subject of barns and outbuildings. Look for me to post it here at the end of the month.

One thing that I discovered has been the answer to a question I have been pondering for some time. I always felt that the abstracted works (see a page of them here) were harder to do for me than strict realist work where the subject is more centered on the illusions of perspective and the goal is to allow the viewer to "read" the landscape as they expect it to be. That's a forest, leading down the hill to that set of buildings. Stuff like that.

I kept thinking, "If I return to stricter reality, will the requirements of perspective and rendering be harder than these intentionally abstracted ones?" Turns out that the realist ones are easier for me, just like I suspected. They are improving as I go along, but I fail less often, and I can leave them on the easel to change a diaper, put in a movie, make lunch, etc.

On the other hand, the Colorist Landscapes require strict focus, and the finished painting needs to be done in one (or close to one) sitting. More failures happen, even though I have been at it for a number of years, now. I have found that the requirements of good abstract work are more taxing on my brain, and simple compositional mistakes have a greater impact.

Intuitive Choices

Abstract Reds Over Blues
20" x 12"
Original Pastel
Casey Klahn
CTA

Under the tutelage of Diane Townsend I painted this abstract work. It has some elements of color field painting, like Mark Rothko, and extensive gestural elements. The gestural nature is in keeping with the drawing roots of the pastel medium. I like the way the paper's surface is evident, and yet the color blending, and heavily worked nature of the piece makes it work as a painting for me.

Let's talk a little bit about intuitive choices in fine art. The choices that a child makes are very intuitive, because their knowledge base is limited. The hands start moving, and the limitations are the length of their little arms, and the characteristics of the tools. They are mostly trying these tools out for the very first time.

A great deal is made of technique in art. The pastel medium is no exception. In fact, technical skill is probably too emphasized in this medium. It's supposed to be hard, you see. And, admittedly, there is much to know (much that I do not know!). Sometimes beginning steps are not rewarded very well by the outcomes.

"Only when he no longer knows what he is doing does the painter do good things."
Edgar Degas said in a quote posted at Expo Degas.

So, intuition! First sketches with bold gestural marks always work better for me than deliberate and measured work. The thing is to have years and years of drawing from memory in one's back pocket, and then the quick marks made on the paper will seem intentional. I don't subscribe to the subtle and tentative working that is often required of detailed realistic work.

The same goes for compositional choices. It is not easy to describe, but I think that studying good composition is necessary, and then ought to be put out of one's mind. If you can internalize compositional knowledge, it will come out naturally as you draw. The best thing I can say is: "try it".

The ability to critique one's own art becomes more important when you want to be an intuition-driven artist. Did this one really turn out to have the best composition? Color Choices? Does it have too much to say for one painting? Ask these questions of yourself.

Wolf Kahn has a chair that he sits in and ruminates over his finished art. Most artists do take some time and distance away from their works to try and get an objective perspective on their own creations. It's challenging.

The pastel medium is "made to order" for the artist who wants to favor intuitive creation. It is a direct, and rewarding tool. It's interesting to consider that in the book, Wolf Kahn's Pastels, the great colorist chose to make the text a collection of essays on artistic process. A natural fit, I think.

Diane Townsend

Diane Townsends in flat light outside. Good thing I'm not a photographer.

I would like to feature a few of my favorite brands of pastels and pastel products, now.
Other than my own hand made pastels, I favor the products of Diane Townsend. I consider Diane a friend, and love her art as much as her great pastels. It looks like she has posted a new gallery of art at her website, and I'll be delighted to look at these for quite a while!
I favor her Terrages, but who wouldn't love a hand made, chunky, very pure-hued pastel, with an addition of pumice to increase adhesion? Her pastels take the form of Terrages (big, with more pumice content) and Soft Form and Fine Line (more of a regular shape, with less pumice, and a unique fine shape which favors gestural marks).
Diane has a broad grasp of art, art history, and she takes a seriously astute and skilled approach to mixing her colors. I am as pleased with her colors as I am with Sennelier's, and maybe more so. The French Sennelier's (featured in my next post) are good for purity and for certain colors being very intense, but I think the DT's are all great for their intensity. Of course, you may not always want intensity, but Lord knows it isn't hard to kill intensity in a color.
They are consistent in handling, and they allow for techniques unparalleled by other brands.
I can scumble (lay down a thin, non-opaque layer over bare paper, or another color layer) in a way that cannot be done with an overly soft pastel.
The Dakota Art Pastels people rate Dianes's two product lines as Numbers #6 and #7, in their hierarchy of softness among pastels. Number #1 means the softest, which is Schmincke, and so on. See that chart here.
Have you heard of her daughter's sanded paper? Very high quality, and the coatings are hand applied. I favor it for doing abstract pastels, and it is completely unlike any other paper I have used. Looks like they now have it in smaller packs, rather than just full sheets.
Diane also seems to be a big fan of Wolf Kahn, with whom she collaborated on some of her colors.

Van Goh and Xanthopesia

Yellow Photoshops while suffering from Xanthopesia

Can you even see the color yellow? You must have xanthopesia.
(Rolling my eyes, and falling on the floor, laughing. Now kicking. Now crying from belly- laughter)
The most preposterous explanation yet of van Gogh's usage of color. If you don't paint the subject by it's local color (it's color in actual reality), then you must suffer from some malady. No, you are crazy. Yes, that's it.

Van Gogh Book Review

Vincent and I consult along the banks of the Seine

"Well, old boy, this Gayford book, The Yellow House, was a cracking good read," says I to the artist's apparition.
"Hharumphh," he offers. Perhaps that nasty gunshot wound to the chest is giving him pains. Perhaps that French waitress hasn't brought his cappuccino quick enough.
And there we have the heart of the problem with these books about the great artist! They attempt to interpret him through various lenses. Who can really guess his intent in a given work of art?
Gayford, whose research and scholarship is second only to those who have compiled and catalogued the complete works of VG, has written much that I like, and much that I argue with.
Do you ever argue with authors as you read their books? I hope so. Critical thought is an essential part of learning.
Gayford proposes that VG's mania, which is thought by some to have been bi-polar disorder (manic depression), is essential to the outcome of his paintings. But, he merely lists a few other artists, authors and composers who have suffered from this disease, without any example or research showing it's effects upon their art.
I think he needs to rule out whether or not any of these afflicted men would have achieved the same levels either without the mania, or with suppression of the mania via treatment. That's a tall order, I know.
Van Gogh's work is unique in history, and quite unrepeatable. No one else will ever jump start the Modernist movement, since that's "in the can", so to speak. But, the level of transformation wrought by the Dutchman's art, such as influencing a score of follow-on movements, opening the way for greater abstraction in art, and for permission to focus more on pure color than ever before, is his mantle alone.
His great influence on art is a ladder of coherence, rather than a byproduct of euphoria.
Of course, his personal story is more dramatic, I think, than any other artist one can think of. It has it's effect on the public's appreciation of him, and it even stereotypes all artists in some rather unattractive ways. But, his posterity is more a matter of the acceptance of his works by the critical art world, his peerage, and the market's raging desire to collect his art. That continues to this day. I dare say that if you found a van Gogh at a garage sale, you would probably not stop at the Antiques Road Show for an appraisal. You'd make a beeline for Christie's or Sotheby's!
I will be plowing through the Complete Works, now, in search of more data on this enigmatic artist. But, I would encourage everyone with a personal interest to look into van Gogh's letters, which are available on the web here. Why not use his own words to tell the story of his art?