Benjamin Abramowitz

Benjamin Abramowitz ( July 3, 1917- November 21, 2011) was an American painter, printmaker and sculptor. First recognized for his remarkable contribution at age 19 as senior artist with the Federal Art Project of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in New York City, he is among the most respected Washington DC artists of the past century

Abramowitz was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1917 to Russian immigrants. As a young child he craved the artistry of signs, posters and illustrations, and was enraptured by the art in museums. Walking hours to study life drawing at the Brooklyn Museum School, at 16 the Brooklyn Museum honored him with his first solo exhibition. He attended the National Academy of Design, absorbing the models of the avant-garde and social-realists, studying the masters. In 1936 he joined the Work Projects Administration using the name of Ben Hoffman and moved through the ranks, as teacher, mural assistant, senior printmaker and painter.[5][6] He was 19 years old. The Metropolitan Museum in New York holds eleven lithographs from the young artist.

In 1941, with the world at war, Abramowitz moved to Washington, taking on U.S. government graphic assignments. He chose to make Greenbelt his base for both home and studio for more than half a century. The postwar years were a time of critical personal and artistic evolution for him. Two young children complicated his daily struggle for time and energy. By day a lithographer, each and every night driven by discipline, he drew and painted.

By the time he was in his early 30’s, Abramowitz had become a celebrated star in the growing Washington, DC-Baltimore regional art scene. From the 1940s on, critics, curators and collectors enthusiastically sought out his work. His work began to be purchased for major regional collections among them, the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Phillips Collection. The Corcoran Gallery of Art selected his work annually for its biennial exhibitions. By the mid-20th century, Abramowitz, was recognized not only as a painter, but also as a teacher and “art coach” throughout the Washington metropolitan area. The Ford Foundation singled him out and sent him throughout the country, lecturing, conducting seminars and critiques as artist-in-residence. All the while, he kept journals and maintained an active correspondence with critics, curators and students.

By the 1970s, he moved beyond the canvas,and turned to making elegant and iconic wall works and freestanding sculptures, some black, some white, filling book after book with ideas for more. He designed four books illustrating the basic principles of the creative experience. Until his mid-80’s, when diminishing vision essentially prevented him from continuing to work, he created steadily and with the same discipline and vigor that marked his earlier years. By 2008, his early work in the WPA became increasingly valuable and recognized, and is currently featured in a touring exhibition.Abramowitz’ distinguished lifework has been cited in numerous prestigious biographical volumes.The National Archives of American Art holds hundreds of papers, letters and other materials.Wikipedia

Rufino Tamayo

Rufino Tamayo was a Mexican painter and printmaker known for his large-scale murals and vivid use of color. Like Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siqueiros, and José Clemente Orozco, Tamayo attracted international attention for Mexican art. Influenced by Modern movements such as Cubism, Surrealism, and Expressionism, Tamayo wove his country’s native motifs into his painting with a signature figurative style. Born on August 26, 1899 in Oaxaca, Mexico, Tamayo left the San Carlos Academy of Fine Arts after a year and began to teach himself. He moved to New York in the 1930s after a falling out with the politically activist artists he knew at home. Tamayo’s work has been exhibited worldwide in museums including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Naples Museum of Art in Naples, The Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid, and the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C. The artist would eventually return to his home country in 1959, where he died on June 24, 1991 in Mexico City, Mexico at the age of 91. In 1981, he founded the Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo, which houses his Modern Art collection, and the Museo Rufino Tamayo in his birthplace of Oaxaca for his extensive pre-Columbian collection.(.artnet)

 Tamayo's method situates his composition as the focal point instead of emphasizing the subject alone. By doing so, looks at the painting as a whole. He explained his approach to Paul Westheim as follows: “As the number of colors we use decreases, the wealth of possibilities increases". Tamayo favored using few colors rather than many; he asserted that fewer colors in a painting gave the art greater force and meaning. Tamayo’s unique color choices are evident in the painting Tres personajes cantando (Three singers), 1981. In this painting, Tamayo employs pure colors such as red and purple; his restraint in the choice of color here confirms his belief that fewer colors, far from limiting the painting, actually enlarge the composition's possibilities. With that being said, Octavio Paz, author of the book Rufino Tamayo, argues that, “Time and again we have been told that Tamayo is a great colourist; but it should be added that this richness of colour is the result of sobriety". By being pure or, as Paz explained, sober with his color choice, Tamayo's paintings were enriched, not impoverished.
“     "If I could express with a single word what it is that distinguishes Tamayo from other painters, I would say without a moment's hesitation: Sun. For the sun is in all his pictures, whether we see it or not." - Nobel Prize-winning poet Octavio Paz. (Wikipedia)

 

Surrealism Rudolf Hausner

Rudolf Hausner (Vienna, December 4, 1914 – February 25, 1995) was an Austrian painter, draughtsman, printmaker and sculptor.
Rudolf Hausner: A major Austrian painter and printmaker, Rudolf Hausner studied art at the Academy in Vienna from 1931 to 1936, under Fahringer and Sterrer. Many of his early paintings were confiscated and branded as 'degenerate' by the ruling nazi party in 1938. In 1941 Hausner was drafted by the German army and remained a soldier until the war's end in 1945. After the war he returned to Vienna and immersed himself in studies dealing with the unconscious and with the art of Surrealists, particularly that of Max Ernst. Along with Wolfgang Hutter and Anton Lehmden, Rudolf Hausner founded the Viennese School of Fantastic Realism in 1947. During the 1950's and 1960's this became one of Austria's most important movements and Hausner was its most influential artist. During this time he also held principal teaching posts at the academies of Vienna and Hamburg.

 Equally gifted as a painter, lithographer and etcher, Hausner's complex art is based upon potent symbols and imagery. Primary among these is the constantly recurring image of the first man, Adam, who is part auto-biographical and part archetype. Another compelling image is that of the man or boy in a sailor's cap. Hausner claimed that this image symbolized the myth of Odysseus and his epic voyages on the seas. It also, however, is representative of the artist's own boyhood and the integrated relationships of youth and age within the self. As with all of Hausner's monumental works of art, the elements within Adam Bei Sich demand a lifetime of contemplation and study.(rogallery.com)

Robert Juniper

Robert Litchfield Juniper, AM (7 January 1929 – 20 December 2012) was an Australian artist, art teacher, illustrator, painter, printmaker and sculptor.

Robert Juniper has been a significant figure in contemporary Australian painting since the 1960's and is recognised as a 'Living Treasure' in his home state of Western Australia . He has exhibited in London (Whitechapel, Tate galleries), and has twice been awarded the prestigious Wynne Prize for landscape painting. In 1984 he received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Western Australia , for his contribution to contemporary Australian art. In November 2005 a park in Perth was named after him by the Minister for Culture and Arts called Juniper Gardens , which showcases his magnificent bronze sculptures.

Robert's work has shaped the way Australian's have imagined their country. He is best known and highly respected for his poetic and visionary approach to landscape, particularly the outback and desert.. His landscapes are a psychological and pictorial interpretation of space, blending his feelings about the landscape with what is visible to the eye. Although identifiable objects appear within his landscapes, the images are often metaphorical and the landscape represented stretches far further than the eye can see. ( Wagner Art Gallery )