Daniel Day Galley
Hearts O’Plenty Exhibition

One of the defining aspects of the end of modernism and the triumph of postmodernism is the absence of easily recognizable art movements. Even among individual artists a diversity of styles, techniques, and subject matter might make it difficult to distinguish any personal signature. Birmingham, Alabama based artist Marjorie Clark Boykin is no exception. Boykin’s work spans genres from animation to meticulous paper cutouts to more traditional easel painting. Her work is on display during February 2010 at Daniel Day gallery features five small paintings that fit into the emerging genre of lowbrow or what is sometimes called pop-surrealism. Arguably this is one of the few types of art being produced today that could be said to qualify as a movement similar to those of the modern era.

Originating in California and having strong Latino influence the lowbrow artists utilize pop culture subject matter and raise any number of commercial “icons” to a level of veneration. Because of the high degree of skill displayed by many of the lowbrow artists the term pop-surrealism is also applied to associate these artists with both the craftsmanship of the surrealist painters and the consumer-based subject matter of the pop artists. The term pop surrealism became widespread with the publication of Kirstien Anderson’s book of the same name. Boykin fits neatly into this “movement.” Her skill as a draftsman is apparent in the works on display at Daniel Day gallery in addition to her other pieces that are often found in various venues around the city and in publications or animation projects. Because lowbrow is a direct assault on “highbrow” art its champions tend to come from other pop media rather than traditional art journals and outlets. For instance the popular website boingboing.net is constantly featuring information about pop-surrealist gallery exhibitions.

The influence of underground comix and the punk rock aesthetic is apparent in Boykin’s work as it is in other artists who associate themselves with the lowbrow genre. Boykin freely acknowledges the influence that the founders of lowbrow art have had on her work. Robert Williams, founder of Juxtapose magazine, has had a tremendous influence in solidifying the genre, as have other artists who began their careers in the 1970s, such as Big Daddy Ross. Ross is known for his drawings of monsters in hotrods and has been instrumental in defining the aesthetic that has been adopted by subsequent artists. The Chicano lowrider car culture, tattoos, and cartoon, hotrod trading cards have helped established the pantheon of imagery that the lowbrow artists have adopted. Boykin observes that having this type of subject matter in a gallery changes the way the viewer regards the work. Notably the same image on a car or wall of an abandoned building would not receive the respect that it gains from its acceptance into the realm of high art by a gallery exhibition.

Unlike their pop predecessors the pop-surrealists tend to be more concerned with a polished, traditional painting technique. Here Boykin is no exception. The five pieces in the Hearts O’Plenty show are masterfully executed as anyone familiar with the artist’s work would have come to expect. One piece features a classic Tex Avery-style wolf, another shows a heart with wings, which is recognizable from the art of underground cartoonist Rick Griffin, and another depicts a Day of the Dead skeleton figure. The final two works depict a cheesecake, pinup girl reminiscent of classic tattoos and a heart with a sword through it. Some of the pop iconography adopted by Boykin is taken from nose cone art of American military aircraft. All of the paintings are complicated and have secondary subject matter including eight balls, black cats, playing cards, and pistols. How one regards imagery that is commonly mass-produced when it is singled out and carefully rendered on canvas is a primary statement associated with pop art. These ideas may or may not be continually explored by contemporary artists in the manner they were when Andy Warhol and his peers founded the original movement but Boykin, for one, is very interested in these issues.

One primary difference between today’s pop-surrealist artists and the earlier pop artists is the choice of subject matter. Television icons are present in both movements but the perception of television in the 21st century is dramatically different than it was in the 1960s. Today we tend to be more media savvy and are less likely to be victims of various messages coming at us from television and other forms of information. We are no longer as trusting as past generations in this concern. The original pop artists had a certain seriousness in their comments on contemporary society that is lacking in the lowbrow artists. The pop-surrealists tend to take consumer culture for granted.

One major difference between pop art and pop-surrealism is the inclusion of religious imagery in the works of many of the younger artists. Though this was common among the surrealists. Boykin refers to some of her iconography as lowbrow religious. The most apparent example of this in the Hearts O’Plenty works is her depiction of a skeleton figure in her piece titled M. Corazon. Corazon is Spanish for heart. The piece was created specifically for the Valentine’s exhibition at Daniel Day gallery.  Much of Boykin’s work features imagery from the Day of the Dead, but it might also include Mexican wrestlers. The commercialization of religious traditions is acknowledged but not criticized by some pop surrealists. There doesn’t appear to be a judgment, but rather an acceptance of contemporary culture. In many cases, such as the modern celebration of the Day of the Dead in the United States, religious practice does seem to have a commercial aspect. The lowbrow artists accept this reality and embrace it as part of their worldview. Jesus and Mr. Spock inhabit the same pantheon for many of these artists. They reflect what we have become in the United States. As much influence as Mexico and Mexican artists have had on the pop-surrealist movement it is still primarily a product of the United States. Finally it should be noted that the lowbrow artists represent a separate school of thought apart from “mainstream” art. They have their own galleries and followings among people who are interested in having their art be entertaining. In Birmingham, Marjorie Clark Boykin is one of the most recognizable members of this movement, if it is fair to acknowledge lowbrow or pop surrealism as a true movement in the traditional sense at all.

German artist Ottmar Horl recently got into some hot water when the above collection of his Garden Gnomes were put on display in Nuremberg.

Lucky for him it was picked up by Time magazine.

This is an updated version of this painting with more natural colors. I am donating it to the Artwalk preamble.

Below is the original with much brighter colors.

New painting of a tree and a pile of rocks.

Here’s a new painting. It’s a kid in a devil mask. It’s named Devil Kid. You can read anything into that that you like. Go ahead, read something into it. Yeah, you’re right, I just thought it was kind of funny. But funny strange or funny ha ha? That’s the question.
Oil on canvas 20″ x 24″

A New York artist has canceled the public showing of his portrait of President Obama after receiving a barrage of angry e-mails condemning the religious nature of the work.

“The Truth,” a painting by Michael D’Antuono, was scheduled to go on view in Union Square in Manhattan to mark the president’s first 100 days in office.

link
WorldNut Daily has the funniest take one the controversy:

Like others in the news who have depicted Obama in Christ-like imagery, D’Antuono insists he isn’t claiming the man is Messiah, but only inviting “individual interpretations.”

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Boris Koller is a fabulous artist who works much in e tradition of Odd Nerdrum. The painting below is called Islands.

This one is Summer in the Pasture.

This one is called Comfort.

Koller’s website can be found here.

The Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts is hosting the first exhibition of sculptures by Bessie Potter Vonnoh (1872-1955) since 1930. Though well known in her day Vonnoh lived long enough to see her work, in fact her very aesthetic, fall out of favor with the art-going public. Organized by Cincinnati Art Museum curator Julie Aronson this show features over thirty of the artist’s works along with documentary photos and two oil portraits of Vonnoh by her husband Robert. The show’s title “Bessie Potter Vonnoh: Sculptor of Women” says as much about the mindset of the early twentieth century as it does about the work of the artist herself. Though extraordinarily gifted, Vonnoh’s subject matter of mothers and children proved palatable to her contemporaries and helped her achieve a level of commercial success that was unusual for a female sculptor at the time.

Feminist art criticism began in earnest in 1971 with the publication of Linda Nochlin’s essay “Why have there been No Great Women Artists.” The issues she raises seem rather obvious today but at the time they were revolutionary. Women have rarely been offered the same opportunities as men to create what has been traditionally considered “great art.” Could a woman have painted the Last Judgment on the on the alter wall of the Sistine Chapel? Today there are a number of large and complicated murals across the world painted by women that will never achieve the exalted status of Michelangelo’s fresco. Nochlin also notes that the canon of great artists has been compiled by a male power structure and goes so far as to disregard stories of innate genius as “obvious fairy tales” that no art historian would take seriously.

Though little known today Bessie Potter Vonnoh was lauded during her productive years. Her work is represented in the collections of many important museums, including the Metropolitan, the Chicago Art Institute and the U.S. Senate Art Collection. Numerous newspaper articles and exhibition catalogs from the era championing Vonnoh’s sculptures have been collected by the Smithsonian Institute and testify to how well she was respected in her day. Admittedly, she rarely strayed from what the market demanded and produced work that society deemed appropriate for a woman. But within these restricting guidelines Vonnoh managed to create sculptures that are emotionally moving and technically stunning.

The majority of Vonnoh’s work is small, “domestic in scale and purpose.” Her themes revolve around motherhood though she never had any children of her own. The three rooms of the exhibition are a celebration of bourgeois domestic bliss as idealized by the gilded age. But the artist seems to have led a relatively bohemian life traveling between an art colony in Connecticut and her artist-filled apartment building in New York City. Success gave Vonnoh the opportunity to visit Europe frequently where she managed to continue producing work and to visit the studio of Auguste Rodin, whose influence is apparent in her bronzes. The one piece in the exhibition representing a figure from the lower classes is the called Italian Mother and depicts a sad figure in a ragged shawl that seems to be burdened by the child she carries rather than blessed like the mothers in the other sculptures.

Vonnoh carved and molded her originals in terra cotta and then often had them bronzed in various foundries depending on her needs at the time. Many of the original terra cotta pieces have been lost due to their fragility. She sculpted beautiful children and contented mothers, themes that would have been deemed appropriate for a woman artist, while her male contemporaries tended to produce grandiose and monumental work. Still, she was respected enough by her peers to have been elected into the National Sculpture Society and the National Academy of Design—now the National Academy Museum. Bronzes of her Young Mother, featured in the exhibition, were bought by no less than nine museums and her clients included celebrities of the time and even President Woodrow Wilson. Young Mother is displayed in three different versions to highlight the creative process of Bronze casting. In one version, cast in 1906, Vonnoh totally reworked the wax mold of the main figure’s head making it much more subtle and detailed.

As the twentieth century progressed the art climate changed and demand for figurative sculpture declined. Later in her career Vonnoh began producing larger works to be displayed outdoors including the Burnett Memorial Fountain in Central Park. A number of fine examples of these larger works are included in the exhibition. With sculptures that are so striking for their combination of classical and modern sensibilities it is clear that fashion is the only explanation for Vonnoh’s fall from stature in the eyes of the art world. By 1935 her production had dropped off considerably due to lack of patrons. This exhibition is long overdue but would not have been possible until recently now that an appreciation for figurative art has returned after a three-quarter-century hiatus.