Norman Rockwell, Jackson Pollock and Ideas

Yellow Trees, Blue Forest
9" x 7"
Pastel
Casey Klahn

This post was originally published in 2008.


It was a great joy to receive the following question from a second grade teacher located in Mexico:

Hi. I would like to know what do you think about the idea of Rockwell of painting Pollock’s in his.


I am teaching 2nd graders about Pollock and I have found it more complex that just dripping!

My reply:

Thank you for the question.


Maybe you saw my post about an image named The Connoisseur that Norman Rockwell did of the well heeled museum patron in front of a Jackson Pollock painting. 

I have a special affinity for NR, as I studied art via the Norman Rockwell Famous Artist's Course for Talented Young People when I was not much older than your second graders. He deserves the renewed interest that the art public is giving him, in my opinion.


On your question. What artist doesn't want to be liked for their artwork? Certainly there was a great deal of "artistic courage" that both of these famous artists exhibited.


NR was big enough in his heart to portray the wholly different painting style of the emerging super artist Jackson Pollock, and at the same time doing this with irony and humor. That was his trademark.


I don't see him passing any negative judgment in his painting, and as far as the art side of it is concerned, the man stands in the middle bottom of the painting, almost like a tree trunk whose canopy is the abstract painting. A wonderful idea, and difficult to pull off. Not at all following strict compositional rules. His talent in composing a painting is on show, here. That's irony, too!


JP had obvious "artistic courage" by not using regular oil paint or regular brushes or even regular primed canvases. He didn't use the easel, either. He was changing everything about painting, or as many things as he could think of to do.


As a contemporary artist, I have been given permission by JP to do more kinds of things to express my art than before he "broke" all those art rules. I choose to repeat my compositions over and over again, to make the point that the colors are the "meaning", not the trees. I like to get rid of "depth", so hammered into my brain by the great Norman Rockwell school. That reminds me (and maybe you, the viewer) that after all, you are looking at a painting about: color.


Kindly,

Casey Klahn

Resolve

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Make your own Automotivator.

Art Is What?

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Is It Art?

Wolf Kahn said, "Each painting has its own dignity, its own requirements."

"But the Devil whoops, as he whooped of old: 'It's clever, but is it Art?'" Rudyard Kipling.

"The air one sees in the paintings of the masters is not the air one breathes." Edgar Degas.

"Why don't you bore a hole in yourself and let the sap run out?"  Groucho Marx. 

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer.

Fauvist Forest, Casey Klahn

"To sum up, I work without a theory. I am conscious above all of the forces involved, and find myself driven forward by an idea that I can really only grasp bit by bit as it grows with the picture." Henri Matisse.

"Always do whatever's next." George Carlin.

"Information is cheap, meaning is expensive."  George Dyson.

"I found that I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way -- things I had no words for." Georgia O’Keeffe.

"A lot of people never use their initiative because no-one told them to." Banksy.

"Each new situation requires a new architecture." Jean Nouvel.

Pierre Bonnard said, "There is also submission to the picture."

This page, and other quotes pages, are available for free download here.

The Prairie in High Country

High Country Prairie

6" x 19.5"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

This is the companion to yesterday's picture.

High Prairie

High Country

6" x 19.5"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

This image was originally published in May.

Bill Me Now - de Kooning Retrospective

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Artist Willem de Kooning's legacy is currently on display in a milestone exhibition of his works rendered over seven decades.  de Kooning, a Retrospective, is open at the Museum of Modern Art from September 18, 2011 through January 9, 2012.


Dutch-born de Kooning emigrated to America in 1926 the way he felt he had to, via stowing away on a merchant ship.  Inhabiting the kind of artist's flats in Manhattan that are part and parcel of the great romantic 20th Century American art story, the young de Kooning labored over his canvases.  The results are now part of the art history canon, and yet for me personally, WdK's art challenges me to struggle.  How can I leave well enough alone when there is more to say?

"Ambiguity prevails in an art and in an age where nothing is certain but self-consciousness." Willem DeKooning.

Shaping de Kooning's Legacy

MoMA Exhibit

New Yorker, Fresh Paint.

Shifting Picture.

Smithsonian Magazine - Willem de Kooning Still Dazzles.




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Bright Trees Ker'sploshun

Bright Trees Through

@ 8" x 5.5"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

There is a viral-like event going on at my new Tumblr page involving this image.  I am surprised and pleased that many bloggers at Tumblr want to feature this image.

MATISSE & PICASSO: The Titans of the Twentieth Century

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Charlie Rose interviews the curators of the Matisse & Picasso exhibit that was up at the MoMA in 2003.  These videos were posted this year.


Kirk Varnedoe and John Elderfield are the curators.

Bellevue Demo Image

Hotel Sol, Italy

@7" x
Pastel
Casey Klahn

This is the painting I did for the demo last week in Bellevue at Daniel Smith.


There will be two workshops next week in Bellevue, on Wednesday and Thursday, October 19th and 20th.

Upcoming Workshops

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Seattle area artists who are interested in taking up pastels will enjoy my Beginning Pastels workshop on Wednesday, Oct. 19th., from 10 till 4. Bellevue Daniel Smith, 15112 N.E. 24th Street, Bellevue -(425) 643-1781. Pre-register, $75.

Those with some experience in using pastels can take an Intermediate Pastel workshop at the Bellevue Daniel Smith store on Oct. 20th., from 10 till 4. Pre-register, $80.

Daniel Smith Workshop.

Directions.


In November, I will be in California's Bay Area to teach the See Differently workshop.  It is in El Cerrito and is almost full.


Over the calender horizon and over the border into Canada, I have a workshop arranged at the Pastel Studio.  The date is to be announced, and because of winter weather I'm thinking of mid summer.

Demo in Bellevue on Wednesday, 10 - Noon.

Free Demo at Daniel Smith, Bellevue.

Pastels are the premier way to get color down on paper with boldness and intensity. This drawing medium acts like anything you want it to – even like a painting medium if you so desire. Artist Casey Klahn will demonstrate his pastel technique, and field your questions during this two hour event.

This is a great FREE pre-view to Casey Klahn’s Pastel Workshops:Beginning Pastel on Wednesday Oct. 19th, and Intermediate Pastel on Thursday Oct. 20th, 2011.

Bay Area Workshop

November 5th. and 6th., and the space is limited.

101 Artist's Blog Topics

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Don't tell me you have nothing to post about:


100 Things I Love About Art
Highlight a Master Artist
Compare Two Master Artists
Your Subjects
Review Your Exhibit


Goal Setting
Photo Journal an Event
Studio Description or Photos


Other Social Media Besides the Blog
Museum Visit
Museum Highlight
List of Links Out to Other Art Blogs


Interview
You Tube of an Art Topic
Tips On Your Media
Art History Topic


Rant
Praise


Personal Story
Personal Opinion
Art Lesson That is Authentically Different
How To Do a Blogger (Wordpress) Task, such as embedding a hotlink in a comment


Guest Blogger
Art News
Take Apart One of Your Paintings


Your Drawings
Group Drawings On a Topic
Post Off Topic (Cuisine/Auto Repair/ Target Shooting/Macrame)
Your Bio


Resume
One Sheet


604 Ideas
Book Review
Highlight a New Blogger
Write an Essay


Make That Essay Into a Series
Take a Poll
Find Out What Your Social Objects Are and Post Them


Meet Another Blogger (Post a Picture)
A Local Attraction
An Obituary


Mind Map Your Blog
Post About Your Mother
Foreign Country
A List of Your Favorite Posts


Your Other Blog(s)
Your Website
An Orginization or Society
Coffee

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Technique That You "Own"
An Art Goal
Your Works from Art School


Art Materials - Something Obscure
Anything That Really Interests You
Something That Happened To You That Was New, Odd, Unusual or Funny.


Newsletter Update
Holiday Greetings
Cats


Another Art Form - Not Your Own
An Art Genre, Such as Portraiture
Participate in a Blog Project
Become an Authority Blog


Any Event That You Find Interesting
A Magazine Article
Research That You Have Done




A Movie Review
Report On An Historical Art Movement
Your Upcoming Exhibit
Post a Fantastic Photoshop of Yourself on the Banks of the Seine with van Gogh

An Interesting iPhone App
A PANO Outside of Your Studio 
Highlight a Great Post on Another Blog and Make a Link


Make Up a Silly Prize and Award it to Someone
Any Excuse to Post a Link List of Your Blogger Chums
Your Insights on the Business of Being an Artist


Your Sketchbook
Write a Formal Critique

Your Influences


Small Studies
The Art Festival 
Quotes


Your Slideshow
Your Video


Details About Your Palette
Your "Take" on the Color Wheel
Tricks for Establishing a Value Composition
Studio Tips


An Art Tool You Made Yourself
Patrons or Collectors
Your Faith and Art
Why You Paint or Draw in Your Style


Art and Health
Art Philosophy
Your painting Holiday or Road Trip


Press Release
Motivational Words, Sentence or Essay
Photos  or Paintings of Snow


Another Artist's Studio That You Admire
Any List That is Topical
The Year In Review






Post Your Latest Artwork

la Différance

A Landscape About Blue

Blue Trees in the Middle Distance
7 - 3/8ths" x 5.75"
Pastel
Casey Klahn

You can make a different painting - a painting and an idea that the world has never seen before.  Here are some ways to make it different.


Be authentic.  Have a new idea, and think of subjects that evoke a response in your own self.  I like to make images of the Hoquiam River that aren't sunny, but that do evoke a feeling of hope and resolve.   


Work with some amount of personal involvement.  That has happened when you have struggled with an image.  Perhaps you lost track of the time.


Don't think; see.


Keep your ideas and your shapes big.


How do you work to gain authenticity?


Next:  101 Blog Post Ideas.  You will have no more excuses.

I Guess By Now You Know That I Don't Have a Method

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Lose The Conventions.

There isn't any magic method for working in the colorist style. So, what is there to teach in a workshop setting? Much! Because in your pastel bag, in addition to your supplies, you also carry around a set of conventions. They are your tried and true, "works every time," methods of working on your pictures.

I want to press those out of you.  The things you see when you search for painting subjects are ever new and fresh.  Can your paintings be new, also?

Hoquiam River Bright 10" x 14.75"Pastel & CharcoalCasey Klahn

Henri Matisse wrote, "We move towards serenity through the simplification of ideas and form.......Details lessen the purity of lines, they harm the emotional intensity, and we choose to reject them. It is a question of learning - and perhaps relearning the 'handwriting' of lines. The aim of painting is not to reflect history, because this can be found in books. We have a higher conception. Through it, the artist expresses his inner vision." Reference.


Workshops.


Next Workshop:  Oakland (El Cerrito), California.  November 5 & 6, 2011. Contact me via e-mail.

Workshop Demands

The following few posts will be my after-action review of the workshop that I held in the Portland area last Spring.  The axiom goes that the teacher learns as much, if not more, than the students in the process of teaching.  Here is my chance to express what I learned at my own workshop titled "Never See Your Pastels The Same Way Again."

Workshop Photos.


Our workshop goals were these:

1. Produce a pastel (painting) that says something new.
2. Gain an appreciation for universal elements of art via Modernist and Colorist ideas.
3. Lose something precious; find new strength.

Art workshops can be demanding on the artist-student, and I have attended ones where I have lost sleep at night because of the challenges to integrating new ideas that the instructor introduces.  So deep and integrated are our creative ideas and patterns that grafting truly new knowledge onto them is an emotional move. 

I liked the advice I read from Wolf Kahn about teaching.  He said, "make demands" of your students.  If you don't bring anything new to the table, why teach at all?

Find out what happened in the posts to follow.

Workshops.

Next Workshop:  Oakland (El Cerrito), California.  November 5 & 6, 2011. Contact me via e-mail.

Photo credit: Katherine van Schoonhoven.

Workshop in Oakland, CA November 5 and 6

See Differently.
Authenticity and Your Art.
Oakland, CA
November 5, 6
$200


To sign up, e-mail me at caseyklahn (at) gmail.com with the attention line: workshop.

Blogger and Artist William Wray's 9-11 Video

John and Joe - StoryCorps 9/11 animation from Rauch Brothers on Vimeo.


William Wray

Sausalito Report

Sausalito is over and I am back home, now.  This was my best year to date, even given the worst economy.  I had to work twice as hard, and "show up to market," which means I had to have the right mix of works to offer.


I will be returning to the Bay Area in early November to teach a workshop.  More on that soon.


One popular event in my booth was a "Flat File Sale."  That is, I sold loose and unframed artworks, both pastels and drawings, at set prices and at make-a-bid prices.  Would you like to participate in that here at The Colorist?  Maybe I can film the file drawers and contents and the bidding can begin.  Just an idea for now, but you could own a Casey Klahn for less if you don't mind doing the framing later.

Illumination at Sausalito

Orchard Illumination

25" x 39.5"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Some of the rewards of exhibiting are unexpected and very dear.


Here is one of the notes I received on Facebook, today:  

Hi Casey, my friend and I just got back from the Sausalito show. We agreed that your work was some of the most beautiful/interesting/professional work there. I'm so glad I got to see these stunning pastels in person, thanks so much!