John Connell

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John ConnellAtlanta, Georgia, 1940 - 2009, Mariaville, Maine

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Connell 11-23-2010

John Connell (born 1940 in Atlanta, Georgia; died September 27, 2009 in Mariaville, Maine) was a contemporary American artist. His works included sculpture, painting, drawing and writing.

Connell attended Brown University, in Providence, RI (1958–1960), the Art Students League, NY (1960–1961) and New York University (1962) where he studied Chinese print making. His first show was in New York in 1962[1].

“ I painted these rooms that were like drooling little flashes of leaves---a quick stroke. I made paper rooms that you would walk into and they would kind of rustle. That was an attempt at an environment. It wasn't terribly complete . . . kind of like the shell. Actually, I didn't think of those as 'environments'. I didn't have that word then.[2] ”

In the mid-60s, he moved to California, where he worked as the set designer for the San Francisco Mime Troupe. In the 70s, 80s and 90s, he worked primarily in the Southwestern United States, where he painted large murals[3] and was visible in New Mexico's most respected art galleries, being part of the Santa Fe artist group Nerve[4] and gaining a reputation for his large installations. He is particularly well known for his drawings, some of which are done in charcoal and spray paint and can be as large as twenty feet high and thirty feet wide.[5]

Connell used plaster-of-Paris in the 80s, and later turned to tar, paper and wax, in large figurative sculptures[6]. He has also used bronze, cement, wood, and chicken wire.[7] His works on paper sometimes includes elements of collage. In the early 80s, he mostly gave up using commercial paints and began making his own out of iron oxide and pigments.[8][6] In more recent paintings, he has used ashes, mud and earth.[9] His work has also included elements of writing and occasionally audio tape.[10]

Connell's influences include Hokusai, Rembrandt, Balzac, Dante, Giacometti and De Kooning. Buddhism is a central theme, [11] and he cited wabi as his aesthetic.[12]

Contents [hide]

1 Projects

2 Public collections holding his work

3 External links

4 References

[edit] Projects

Some of his better-known projects include:

The Construction of Kuan-Yin Lake (1982–1989): A multimedia project that included sculpture, painting, writing and audio and was partially funded by the National Endowment for the Arts[13][14].

The Raft Project (1989–1994): A giant sculpture/painting project with painter Eugene Newmann. It was commonly perceived as being a takeoff on Géricault's The Raft of the Medusa[15].

[edit] Public collections holding his work

Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York

Albuquerque Museum, Albuquerque, New Mexico

Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas

Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, Arkansas

Bates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, Maine

Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Texas

The Harwood Museum of Art, Taos, New Mexico

The Hess Collection, Napa Valley, California

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, Alabama

New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico

Roswell Museum and Art Center, Roswell, New Mexico

Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, Arizona

Scottsdale Center for the Arts, Scottsdale, Arizona

University of Arizona Art Museum, Tucson, Arizona

University Art Museum, Albuquerque, New Mexico

[edit] External links

Artist's Web Site

[edit] References

1.^ Art in America, October 1979

2.^ ARTlines, April 1983

3.^ Albuquerque Journal, July 30, 1978

4.^ Artlives, 1984

5.^ Tierra Encantada, 1990, Kansas City Art Institute

6.^ a b Pasatiempo, April 12, 1996

7.^ Los Angeles Times, Feb. 14, 1986

8.^ ARTlines, April 1983

9.^ Art Papers, May 2006

10.^ Revered Earth, 1990, Center for Contemporary Arts of Santa Fe

11.^ ARTlines, April 1983

12.^ Hess Art Collection, Hatje Cantz, 2010

13.^ The New York Times, December 14, 1986

14.^ Santa Fe Reporter, March 8, 1989

15.^ ARTnews, Summer 1993

Persondata

Name Connell, John

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Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Connell"

Categories: 1940 births | American printmakers | Artists from New Mexico | Artists from Maine | Postmodern artists | Modern painters | American muralists | American sculptors | Modern sculptors | Contemporary sculptors | Contemporary painters | Installation artists | Members of Art Students League of New York | 2009 deathsPersonal tools

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