Another Artist I love: Wayne Thiebaud

-

This is a good time to Celebrate Wayne Thiebaud, American painter, born in 1920; that makes him one hundred years old; at least he will be on November 15.  And he's still painting!

This was my first Thiebaud; I found it in the postcard rack at the Whitney gift shop.  I couldn't believe it was a painting and I couldn't stop staring at it.  Those patterns, the lush paint, those creamy pies.  It was delicious. I loved that something so fun, so pretty, was thought of as ART.  

Stephen Kinzer wrote in the NY Times, 

"In other hands, these objects could easily become Pop Art or Kitsch.  Mr.Thiebaud, however, paints them respectfully, without a hint of irony."  

In February2001 the Phillips Collection in Washington DC held a retrospective of his paintings.

This is the Corcoran Gallery, also in DC, and they held a show of Thiebaud's prints. It's a handsomer building than the Phillips.

This is the page in my diary from the week I visited that show.  I read about it in the Times and even though it was coming to New York in the spring I didn't wait. I made a date with two of my southern relatives, my sister-in-law, Donna, and cousin Kate.  We met there and had a fabulous time.



Can you read the quote from Barnet Newman? It says about  a painting of three gumball machines,

" Shiny objects of desire...This painting is hope and possibility...evocation of the American Dream...All those globes of colored beauty-and for a penny out comes something sweet and wonderful."

The Phillips Collection Newsletter says "the artist's colorfully modern style combines representation and abstraction, seriousness and wit, historical references and direct observations."

I bought the catalog.


He also paints humans and landscapes.

In the book, I've kept all reviews from that time.


Thiebaud says he steals from other artists. "It's hard for me to think of artists who weren't influential on me because I'm such an obsessive thief." He lists Ingres, Vermeer, Horace Pippin, Rockwell Kent.

 I found something in Thiebaud to steal.  He often gives his figures a heavy outline in a contrasting, or complementary color. Here I tried it with Mariano Rivera.



Who do you think is on the cover of the New Yorker this week?  A double scoop of Thiebaud! He's one hundred years old and he's still making art!
Here's a link to a short interview with Wayne and Francoise Mouly.

https://tinyurl.com/New-Yorker

I'm not waiting 'til November to say Happy Birthday, Congratulations and Thank You,

Wayne Thiebaud!

(It's pronounced Teebow)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I'm Keeping' on the Sunny Side

-
Image
 Good Morning!  I was thinking about posting a reprise of an old post about PINK, to keep the Barbie vibe going; I understand that in London they've painted all the red telephone booths pink and the great Ferris wheel has pink lights in honor of Her Plasticness but I had a better idea--you could say the Sun came up! You know I have a granddaughter named Sunny, right? I wanted to do a drawing for her and what else could I start with? The Sun and sunflowers--not very original but she's two and a half--to her everything's new and it's her name! Filling in the sky I see that it looks like the way I draw water, but that's OK.  I added Batchelor Buttons beneath the Sunflowers and I like the way the blue makes the yellow pop.  I'm not sure how to handle the transition from flowers to sky so I won't think about it.  Remember Mickey Rivers; "I don't worry about what I can control because if I can control it why worry?" And I'm in control! I used som
Read more

Oh, Russell

-
Image
 I have to teach Russell that when I say, "I just devoured that book!" I don't mean it literally. However, I must admit that he has a discerning eye, and has brought some forgotten favorites back to my attention, like this -- Art Nouveau  by Martin Battersley, from The Color Library of Art.     Here is Symbolist poet Robert de Montesquiou, an aristocrat and a dandy, the original of Proust's Baron de Charlus. I placed him with this Barbie because she has a Belle Epoque kind of vibe.  The painter is Giovanni Boldini 1842-1931. "He fascinated his sitters by his method of painting, gazing at them intently as though to draw out their inmost secrets and then attacking the canvas with long brushes held at arm's length. He transformed his sitters into almost impossibly seductive creatures striking languorous poses and suggested that the slightest movement would result in the beautifully painted silks, chiffons, lace and chinchilla falling off to reveal them in writhi
Read more

Summer Reading

-
Image
What are you Reading?  I love it when someone asks me that. The Times Book Review has a column that asks what's on your night table?  Does everybody read in bed?  If I have a good book I can't wait to say good-night. But as reading and writing has made me focus on language an abyss of bad grammar has opened before   me and I cry out in anguish. Will I ever become inured to hearing Ivy League graduates on NPR saying, "Him and Me are gonna..." and "Please reach out to John or I?" Terry Gross never corrects anyone's grammar and I respect  that,  it's not a good interviewing technique,  but where are the mothers and teachers?  How has it come to this? And another thing! The misplaced modifier!   In a biography of Willa Cather I read, "At the age of eight, school began to bore Willa."  Really? School was eight years old?  Miss Cather is rolling over in her grave.  And this, from Elle Decor; "As a young girl, her father affectionately nickna
Read more