Rethinking the Calligraphic Content of Robert Motherwell

"One of the very best of the Abstract Expressionists"

- Clement Greenberg

"You let the brush take over and in a way follow its own head, and in the brush doing what its doing, it will stumble on what one couldn’t by oneself...Its’s essential to fracture influences in the same way that free association in psychoanalysis helps to fracture one’s social deceptions."
- Robert Motherwell

"Though always abstract and painterly, Mr. Motherwell’s work expressed his literary and philosophical c oncerns and his deep involvement with the culture of Mediterranean Europe. A large man who moved and talked slowly, the artist never lost his Abstract Expressionist view of painting as a struggle, a "state of anxiety" as he once put it, "that is obliquely recorded in the inner tensions of the finished canvas"
- Grace Cluneck, New York Times, July 18, 1991

"Robert Motherwell put a Chinese mountain on a stick."
-Janet Kozachek

In preparation for my lecture on East/West influences, I read about Robert Motherwell’s collection of Japanese calligraphy as well as his interest in Zen philosophy. The influence of calligraphy became very clear to me when I revisited Motherwell’s monumental canvases, especially his Elegy series. Many of these were very close to actual Chinese/Japanese characters, and a number of them were identical. Looking at Elegy to the Spanish Republic, number 70, for instance, one can clearly see the relationship to the character for "zhou," or a river basin. Sometimes Motherwell used this dot, line, dot, line, dot sequence in an altered form, with one dot moved over. Other times he kept the sequence identical. For comparison, I have a piece of calligraphy for the character "zhou."

I began to see many more instances of Chinese/Japanese characters in Motherwell’s work. The word for "little" the word for "large" appearing multiple times. In this example, Motherwell’s Gypsy Curse, we can see a clear representation of the character for mountain mounted precariously on a thin pole, or stick. The representation of the character for mountain here, comes from the Shu Fa Da Zi Dian, a compendium of various Chinese character scripts. One could say that Motherwell’s three pronged form is actually a trident, and it could be. But the knowledge that he collected calligraphy does make me wonder if this was actually the influence for his forms. The character for mountain, like the character for river basin, are very common and would have appeared multiple times in his collections of calligraphy.

Interestingly, during my lecture, the audience saw these connections quite clearly. I was asked a question about why Motherwell would not have acknowledged his Asian influences and I was not certain that I gave a thorough answer. In reading more art criticism from the 1950's until the present day, I believe the answer lies in how that criticism shaped and continues to shape, our opinions about art and in how artists were, and still are compelled to describe their work.

A hesitancy to acknowledge and even to hide sources of artistic inspiration may have been encouraged by the writings of the art critic Clement Greenberg, who strongly emphasized originality in the artists who were granted his highest accolades. Greenberg cast a long shadow over the way art was taught, discussed and created for several decades. Art that had historically identifiable influences or incorporated the art of other cultures was  labeled as "derivative." Given this critical environment, Motherwell, even if he had wanted to acknowledge his influences, would not have been able to. Otherwise he would have risked the opprobrium of the harshest critic of his time.

During the Cold War politics of the 1950's, there was a strong emphasis upon the idea of American genius being free, unfettered and spontaneously springing from the mind of the artist - like Athena springing from the head of Zeus - birthed fully formed, fully adult, and ready for a fight. Motherwell’s own words "Its essential to fracture influences," has a destructive quality to it. Like tilting at windmills, it is a feat that is ultimately (and fortunately) humanly impossible. For although we may not acknowledge that what we hear and see, we hear it and see it nevertheless.

The third factor that might cause an artist not to acknowledge sources has to do with race and gender. If someone acknowledges having been tutored or influenced by a person who represents a less powerful minority or any kind of gender or ethnicity that is outside of the accepted cadre of one’s peers, then this might diminish one’s own perception as well as the public perception, of the artist’s prowess. What if Elvis Pressley, for instance, also of the 1950's, had acknowledged, every time he stepped up to the mike, that his famous Hound Dog song was originally written for, and performed by, Big Mama Thornton? It would certainly have been more honest, more fair.

The American obsession with the new, the different, the original, and the powerful, especially in the arts, has cost many an artist several unnecessary trips down consecutive rabbit holes. It is difficult to imagine going to an art museum with eyes closed and hands over ears in order to not be "influenced" by anything, yet that is unfortunately how the heuristic training of artists had largely developed, with some notable exceptions. Ironically, however, this approach oftentimes generated monotony and unoriginality, possibly because the acceptable range of art worth emulating - those deemed most original - would be so narrow.

The Abstract Expressionists of the 1950's, including Robert Motherwell, were bold and innovative artists. Looking at these paintings is sheer joy. They appear exuberant to me - pure expressions of life and optimism for an adventurous future. Knowing the stylistic sources of their inspiration, when and if these can be found, would not diminish, but enrich them, as it would our understanding of the larger world of culture and history.

https://www.gregkucera.com/motherwell_biography.htm



https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/henry-moore/courtney-j-martin-a-sincere-academic-modern-clement-greenberg-on-henry-moore-r1171902

Richland County Library Event: Meet the Artist Janet Kozachek and find out The Meaning Behind the Art

In one week I will be giving a lecture about the exhibition Transformations and Translations: The Art of Una Kim and Janet Kozachek. Professor Una Kim will be teaching back in Portland on the other coast at the time so unfortunately will not be in attendance. But we spoke on the phone about her work so I can hopefully elucidate the meaning behind her images. The talk, Meet the Artist - Janet Kozachek - The Meaning Behind the Art, will take place Thursday evening, January 31, at 6 PM at Richland County Library on 1431 Assembly Street in downtown Columbia, SC. If there are only twenty attendees or under, I will be handing out free signed copies of my book of rhymes for the cat, The Book of Marvelous Cats. Due to a snag in a printing order, I have some extra copies that could be put to good use.

Part of my lecture will be straightforward translations of the text in my work, because it is in Chinese. The other half of my lecture will be to explain the theme of transformations in the exhibition. Why is there a head that has a wolf sprouting from its chin on top of a high rise in Una Kim’s mixed media work You can be Replaced? What does the Chinese say in the corner of Janet Kozachek’s Oh Me! Oh My! My Grains! My Grains? Come to the lecture if you just have to know.

Many thanks again to the Confucius Institute at the University of South Carolina for their generous sponsorship of this event.

Please note: an earlier version of this post listed Friday, not Thursday as the day of the week for this talk.

The Art of Erica Chappuis: An Exotic New Wave

Today I am introducing my third figurative painter in my series on contemporary artists who are shedding new light on a traditional subject. The following is an edited conversation with Detroit mixed media artist and writer Erica Chappuis.

JK: I generally don’t speak about art until I see it in person because there are certain aspects of scale, texture, and dimension that might not be fully experienced through digital imagery. But your images were so compelling that I broke my own rules. Can you walk us through some of the materials used in Port of Call, tell us about those choices and create a tactile sense of it?

EC: In Port of Call I used a tawdry but kind of sexy second-hand bodice I found at a thrift store, plus an old sweater of my son's, a bit of silk skirt, a linen tea towel imprinted with various ships, some leather, a vintage lace doily, beads and acrylic paint. I also used quite a few gel medium molds I made of various things such as a sea fan, horse heads, trinkets and other objects. The gel medium molds are something I invented when I needed objects but did not want the weight. I also used wine corks for the fingers. For the woman’s face I used a vintage photo as a reference. She has a sort of peaceful look, in spite of the fact that she is embracing Death.

JK: How did you deal with substances that might change or deteriorate over time?

EC: For the breasts I did not leave in the foam that formed the bust of the bodice. I have seen foam turn yellow and flake, and I wanted materials that might last longer so I used a plain polyurethane Christmas ball which I cut into two halves and placed underneath the bra part of the bodice. It worked really well.

JK: Is the woman of Maiden Voyage one of the mermaids?

EC: I did not think of her as a kind of mermaid but as a young woman first setting out in the world. She has a doll's head floating in the debris that surrounds her. She has "put away childish things" and she sinks or swims in the swirling waters however she has prepared herself. It also happened to be the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, so that stimulated my thoughts. My own parents came over from England in an ocean liner and my family worked for all the shipping companies that originated from Liverpool. I think of some of the ships - those that brought family members over - almost as members of the family as well.

JK: In addition to painting and mixed media collage, you sometimes use found objects as well. Does this inform your three dimensional work as well? And, if so, how?

EC: I often find inspiration in found objects and habitually haunt flea markets, thrift stores and beaches. Almost anything can set off a new painting - everything is interesting - bones, glass, driftwood, fabrics, jewelry.. The most basic inspiration is fabric, but after my early days with painting over fabric collage I have graduated to plenty of three-dimensional objects and embellishments. An antique reel inspired a whole assemblage concerning a mermaid, a lighthouse, and a fisherman. When turned, the reel brings a mermaid up from a vintage washboard sea. I like to see where objects that I find will lead

JK: You have made Detroit your home and studio. What brought you to Detroit and what impact has that had upon your work?

EC: We moved to Detroit in 1982. We have lived through decades of the ups and downs of the auto industry, a disintegrated city and a reborn one. But I cannot say that industry has really influenced me or even affected me artistically. The thing about Detroit that has affected me has been the idea of using the cast-offs, the unwanted, while living in close proximity to a maritime culture and history has been far more important. Although we are located inland, we have ships from across the world that arrive in this port. This has tied into my own family's history, as I come from a line of seafarers. The seafaring becomes a metaphor, one which hopefully speaks with some poignancy of time floating by and the discarded and forgotten.

JK: According to the American Civil Liberties Union, nudity or sexual content is the most frequently cited reason for censorship in art. Some of your work is unabashedly erotic. Has that been problematic in having your work publicly exhibited? Have you ever had to pull work from an exhibition?

EC: Censorship is a fact of life these days and always has been. I had a perfectly classical nude rejected by a Japanese print show many years ago, and I have had tasteful nudes displayed in gallery windows receive complaints from neighbors (who always express concern for school children walking past) and the gallery owners finding it necessary to cover up said nude. I had a nude angel rejected by a church art show. I haven’t had much issue with the very explicitly erotic work since I exhibit it in venues where they are only visible to people who directly wish to see them. Clearly I wouldn’t be submitting explicit work to a church show, or allow it to be displayed in a gallery window. But although I am not currently producing explicitly erotic work, my mermaids are nude and my bar girls are often a little risque. In most places that has not been an issue but it wouldn’t come as a great surprise if it were.

JK: How might a woman artist’s perspective broaden understanding about the nature of human interaction, especially between genders?

EC: I’m not entirely certain most women artists can offer much of a difference in the nature of human interaction, mainly because a painting is not a play. It is limited in what it can show without a time-based part of the work - such as would exist in a play, video or performance. If a woman artist is working in those media, then she has a better chance of expressing such ideas. If a painter or sculptor, working in more traditional ways were to attempt it, it might come off as poster or propaganda work. I think some ideas are better expressed via a play, novel, poem or new art media with time based aspects. The best I can do in my painting, so far, is to depict men and women in roles that are the opposite to how they traditionally would have been seen, or else produce something that might feel like propaganda. Also I believe women have inherited a great deal of how men view the world and it takes a different medium to see it differently.

JK: I’m curious about what might feel like propaganda to you. Can you explain how you mean that?

EC: Propaganda art can be as simple and as crude as a war poster, whether pro or con, a message from the health department, or it can be art that in some way supports a certain political or social view. It may or may not be subtle. The Nazis were famous for enjoying certain works that promoted a particular physique and social structure - we call that totalitarian art. And art that would attempt to fashion or even to blatantly question issues between men and women, feminist art, can also be rather transparent and therefore come across as somewhat crude and simplistic. That doesn't mean it isn't useful - it is! But it actually has a different purpose than what we usually think of as "fine art". Sometimes propaganda is so elevated that it becomes unquestionably fine. I think the paintings of Robert Henri, for instance, informed as he was on social issues and compassion for the poor, the non-white, the earthy and genuine, do attempt to project a dignity on what were considered humble subjects. He did it so well and with love for humanity's infinite variety, that it completely transcends propaganda.

JK: You frequently depict images of women in your work. In contemporary art criticism, much has been made about the "male gaze" in art and cinema. In what ways might images of women created by other women change that gaze? And it what ways might it not?

EC: I think women see via "male gaze" every bit as much as men do. We have inherited all of art history and so its limitations are ours as well. Also, a lot of women, especially young women, revel a bit in the male gaze. John Berger says that men look at women and women look at themselves being looked at. I think this is profoundly true. I see young women enjoying their sexual expression and the effect they have on men. I think they know how to "stage" themselves and enjoy doing it. I don’t see my work as much different in its erotic nature from that. "I know what boys like" every bit as much and stage my paintings to express at least some of that. And do girls like anything all that different? I’m not so sure they do!

JK: How does an artist, then change the way, say a woman is viewed in an artwork and thereby broaden perspectives?

EC: The only way I have been able to find for myself a way to change the gender of the viewer in my paintings is to change the gender of the subject and even that is no guarantee that I’m getting away from the "male gaze," because my male Siren is going to appeal to some men. In fact, my female Sirens may appeal to women more than men. Women do look at other women and enjoy looking at female bodies as depicted in art. We have adopted the "male gaze" and use it, both for our enjoyment and for the manipulation of social situations. It has never changed and I doubt it ever will. It has been since the cave paintings of Lascaux - paintings that may well have been made by women as well as men for all we know.

JK: What about how women, especially women artists, might fix their gaze upon themselves?

EC: I do see how some women artists equate the earth with their own bodies, some who create works with earth and other natural elements, and others who do work using photographs or video with a "Goddess" attitude or philosophy behind it. Although many of those works are very beautiful and often poignant,, I’m not sure that they are very different in kind than a female (or male) nude "served up" erotically to the viewer. They are still women looking at women - which apparently women prefer to looking at men, from all the studies I’ve ever seen. This is an appreciation for everything that a woman’s body contains: symbolism, magic, creation and eroticism.

JK: You collaborate with writers and write very proficiently yourself. How has writing balanced your visual art and what is the relationship between text and image?

　

EC: I have collaborated with other writers, mostly illustrated the erotic tales of Vanna Vechian, whom I have never actually met. I also co-wrote a couple of stories with her. I am not sure she has a website currently. The writing on my website is all my own. I do quite a bit of writing, mostly micro-stories that are stimulated by the process of my own painting - an ekphrastic style of writing that comes to me as I am actually painting.


I have also illustrated the stories of Subcomandante Marcos the spokesman of the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico.
Those stories may be seen here: http://la.utexas.edu/users/hcleaver/Chiapas95/CWDTableOfContents.html

...and are also available for purchase from Amazon.

I also illustrated a couple of Marcos stories privately and have published one of those in a very limited edition handmade volume.

JK: Many artists I have spoken with have someone in their lives that serve as their professional advocates. This might be a formal arrangement through a paid agent or an informal one via a friend, spouse, or child. Whether formal or informal, these agents allow an artist to spend more time in the studio by taking over the business and social, and promotional aspects of being an artist. Is there someone like that in your life whom you wish to acknowledge?

EC: There is no question but that this would be my husband, Laurent. He has supported me and my work since I met him in 1977, when he was an exchange student from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne and I was a first year art student at Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh. He has been steadfast in his support. That means he has done his best to provide studio space and technical support whenever possible and of course emotional support throughout our relationship.

JK: You collaborate with writers and write very proficiently yourself. How has writing balanced your visual art and what is the relationship between text and image?

　

Links:

www.ericachappuis.com


https://www.aclu.org/other/freedom-expression-arts-and-entertainment
http://theconversation.com/how-john-berger-changed-our-way-of-seeing-art-70831

http://www.daisy.co.uk/sites/VannaVechian/vannastories.htm

Transformations and Translations: The Art of Una Kim and Janet Kozachek at Richland County Library

Opening Reception for Transformations and Translations: The Art of Una Kim and Janet Kozachek. It was a warm and lovely evening and the event was well attended. What a relief, though, to have the hard work over!

The audience was receptive and asked a lot of questions about the work. So many people were engaged with the art and I was encouraged by their willingness to explore complex pieces with all manner of hidden signs and symbols that must be ferreted out.

I was truly grateful for the opportunity to exhibit in a regular gallery setting again, too, for the first time in five years! If you get a chance, stop by this weekend for a look. The exhibition is open during normal Library Hours: M - TH 9 - 9 Friday - Saturday 9 - 6 and Sunday 2 - 6.

Janet Kozachek and Una Kim at Richland County Library

Transformations and Translations: The Art of Una Kim and Janet Kozachek, opens today at the Richland County Library at 1431 Assembly Street in Columbia, SC.  Opening Reception will be January 11 from 6:30 - 8:30 pm.   The exhibition is also open during normal library hours through March 29: M-TH 9:00 am - 9:00 pm FRI - SAT 9:00 am - 6:00 pm. Sunday 2:00 - 6:00 PM.

We look forward to seeing you there for this unique exhibition.  At left:  Una Kim: You can be Replaced.  Mixed Media on Paper.   Below:  Janet Kozachek: Artifacts 
Pencil on Paper.

The Japanese Stamp Drawing Number Three

This last drawing of a stamp rounds out a triptych on that theme. It started with the completion of a drawing with a Taiwanese stamp. I paired it with a Bulgarian stamp to make the drawings in to a diptych. The Japanese stamp from 1969 had been in folio ever since that date in childhood when my father found it on a shipping package and harvested it for his children’s stamp collecting activities. I had written earlier about why I had picked the stamp out for my collection, much to a muted snickering response from my brothers, as the Japanese woman in the stamp had no shirt on. But I saw something special in the stamp so kept it.

Doing some research in to the possible origins of the image, I came across some sites about commemorative stamps produced in Japan in the late 1960's and early 1970's. These featured the works of Japanese artists who had studied abroad in the early part of the twentieth century and learned western style figurative painting and drawing from the nude. Just as in China, Japan had no figurative tradition involving the nude figure, save for erotic art, and even the latter sported figures that were mostly clothed.

So when Japanese artists incorporated the nude or semi-nude figure in to their traditional wood block prints, it was a radical idea. Some of these also experimented with western perspective and foreshortening, as well as richly patterned backgrounds. In most of these, the nude was an aesthetic solitary figure, alone at her mirror or playing with a cat. I never did find the artist who created my stamp of the woman having her long hair combed, but did find a number of Japanese artists working in the 1930's who were making stunning wood block prints in art deco style. One artist, Kobayakawa Kiyoshi, created this lively woodcut print of a dancer in 1932. Smitten by the image, I incorporated this in to my design as well.

There is an amusing little detail in Kobayakawa Kiyoshi’s depiction of the Japanese woman dancing in western costume with high heels. Look carefully at the left foot and you will see that the shoe does not quite fit and her little toe is sticking out.

Links:

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/87116574016809130/

http://www.hanga.com/bio.cfm?ID=41

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/23/arts/design/deco-japan-shaping-art-and-culture-at-japan-society.html

http://library.princeton.edu/news/marquand/2017-01-16/celebrating-japanese-%E2%80%9Ccreative-print%E2%80%9D-1924-1930

https://hyperallergic.com/336964/an-alluring-glimpse-into-japans-embrace-of-art-deco/

Richland County Library Exhibition

Today I delivered my half of the drawings and paintings for our upcoming exhibition, Transformations and Translations: The Art of Una Kim and Janet Kozachek.  The exhibition opens on January 7 at the Richland County Library.  Click on the Exhibitions button at left for more details.
The largest work in the show will be my acrylic and paper collage on canvas, A Dance of Heaven and Earth: From Inside to Outside and from Above to Below.
 In keeping with the bilingual theme, the composition is interspersed with Chinese characters written in various styles, all referring to the title.  The hidden characters are: inside:  内
 outside: 外 outside is written in a style called "grass," which is a lively cursive script.
above: 上 Is written in bold, regular script called "kai"  as is the character for below: 下

 heaven: 天  is written in an ancient form called "seal script," which is somewhat pictographic.

The earth, 土 is even more ancient in form and refers to a shrine to the earth.  Follow the central dancer's gaze downward to see it:

Finally, the dance：舞  This character was originally printed on to the paper from a stone seal that I had carved but the print did not take well and I ended up touching it up a bit with paint.  This is also the ancient form of the character. 

Cat Got Your Tongue Again?

The charcoal and pastel drawing Cat Got Your Tongue?, was begun a few years ago and I thought that it was finished, as it served its purpose at the time. With the approach of my two person exhibition, however, Cat now serves a newly revised linguistic purpose. My two person exhibition with Una Kim, Transformations and Translations: The Art of Una Kim and Janet Kozachek, will be permeated with all kinds of language and cultural ironies.

For this reason, my revised Cat Got Your Tongue? Now incorporates word play. Looking closely at the tongue of the cat you can see a Chinese character. It is the word teng, a verb meaning "to transcrib." Teng happens to sound like "tongue." Hence the cat not only has your tongue, he has your teng, too, and you are literally at a loss for words. The pearl necklace underneath the poor figure whose tongue is being bitten also sports Chinese characters. These are also pronounced teng (remember sounds like "tongue"), but are words for pain. A cat biting your tongue would be painful.

  A last verbal pun is included on the final pearl, which also reads teng, but is the word for "gallop." The Chinese language is known for homophones, with an infinite potential for puns, some of which fortunately sound like English.

The Bulgarian Stamp

The still life with an enlargement of an old Taiwanese stamp seemed to beg for a companion. Perusing my stamp collection from the 1960's, I came across a Bulgarian stamp that incorporated an art deco looking fish. The Latin words on the stamp identify this as a Hake fish, native to the South African coast. Could it have been part of a series of stamps depicting fish from around the world?

This stamp set the stage for everything that now surrounds it in the final composition. The old antique Encyclopedia of Embroidery yielded some designs with fish motifs, which I painstakingly rendered stitch by stitch. A fossil shark’s tooth served as a three dimensional "buckle" to unify all the paper and fibers in the composition. Finally, I transcribed from The Book of Songs, a poem about fish in a quiet pool.

In a final quirky finish, I signed my name in Cyrillic on the stamp, matching the Cyrillic script for Bulgaria.

Still Life with a Stamp of a Painting by Lang Shi Ning

My preparations for my two person exhibition with Una Kim are under way. Transformations and Translations: The Art of Una Kim and Janet Kozachek is shaping up to be a lovely and thought provoking show. Just as the title suggests, the exhibition is about two artists who trained in both Asia and the United States. We both met at Parsons School of Design in 1988, where we completed our graduate education in figurative painting and drawing. But we both had another side of our artistic selves that had previously been nurtured in a very different tradition. Una was an artist in Korea before the U.S. and I had lived in the People’s Republic of China for many years, where I trained in Chinese language and studio art at the Central Academy of Fine Art. East/West art is difficult to reconcile, as the crux of what is considered "right" and "good" in art is fundamentally different.

Through our art work, we acknowledge that which is translatable and that which is not. While engaged in translating an aesthetic, we are also introducing visual commentary on the what has been transformative in the years since leaving formal education behind. This includes confronting the cultural challenge of being an immigrant for Una and confronting a life changing illness for me.

After many years of difficult work, my body has become stronger and more capable of doing the work of writing, creating art work, and most recently, teaching again (albeit ever so slightly). My most recent work reflects that in its shift in focus from the transformed body on to the Translations part of our exhibition. It is still rendered in the black and white of my Kafkaesque drawings, but now plays with language and cross cultural influences. Some of this is subtle, as in my flattened out drawings of postage stamps and textile art. Enjoy here a drawing that includes a stamp with a picture of a painting by Lang Shi Ning, an eighteenth century Italian artist who traveled to China during the Qing dynasty and became a court painter for the emperor.