Art Painting No. Untitled #14 Artist: John

Art

PAINTING No.

Untitled #14

Artist: John McLaughlin

Paragraph: John McLaughlin was not a formally trained artist and started painting relatively late in life. A career in the military and foreign services brought him to Japan, exposing him to different artistic perspectives, forms, and styles. However, Mondrian would influence McLaughlin's artistic influences far more. McLaughlin came to rely on a minimalist color palette consisting often of only solid chunks of black, white, or primary colors. The artist uses correspondingly constrained forms and shapes. A champion of absolute abstraction, McLaughlin sought to stimulate "the viewer's natural desire for contemplation without benefit of a guiding principle." Untitled #14 exemplifies Mclaughlin's philosophy of abstraction. Using only black and white in solid architectural blocks, the artist encourages the viewer to speculate on the meaning of art itself.

PAINTING No.

Equivalent

Artist: Richard Anuszkiewicz

Date: 1966

Paragraph: Trained at the Yale University School of Art, Richard Anuszkiewicz's career spans several different and seemingly divergent artistic styles. He was also a forerunner of the op-art movement. Op-art plays with optical illusions through the seemingly simple arrangement of forms, lines, and colors on the two-dimensional canvas. Thus, a two-dimensional plane can convey three-dimensional reality. In paintings like Equivalent, the artist invites the viewer to experience the interface between perception, cognition, and aesthetics. Anuszkiewicz describes the painting as "archetypal," in that it serves as a prototype of form, color, and shape. Equivalent also connotes exquisite balance, which is why the painting may be placed horizontally or vertically for different effects.

PAINTING No. 3

Seated Man with Blue Face and Red Hand

Artist: Nathan Oliveira

Date: 1970

Paragraph: Born in Oakland in 1928, Nathan Oliveria went on to become one of the most formidable figures in 20th century Bay Area art. Oliveira would also go on to teach art at Stanford University before his death in 2010. The dynamic career reveals various influences, as the artist has said that he is more concerned with continuity than with invention. His style is expressionistic, and through his painting Oliveira captures the confluence between individual psychology and social realities. In Seated Man with Blue Face and Red Hand, Oliveira depicts a solitary and androgynous figure. The figure appears awash in multiple layers of color applied with frenetic strokes suggesting emotional and mental movement. Against a plain background, the figure's individuality is highlighted and simultaneously contrasted strikingly with the surrounding environment.

PAINTING No. 4

Mirror, Skull, and Chair

Artist: Paul Wonner

Date: 1960-62

Paragraph: Although he was born in Tucson, Arizona, Paul Wonner became firmly entrenched in the Bay Area Figurative movement. His well-developed abstract expressionist style is exemplified in Mirror, Skull, and Chair. Broad and bold, heavy brushstrokes render solid forms with geometric integrity. A unique take on a memento mori still life composition, Wonner uses a cheerful color palette to belie the heaviness of death represented by the skull. Death is depicted alongside everyday items like a chair and newspaper, as if to trivialize mortality. The presence of a framed picture simultaneously encourages thoughtful reflection on the past. The result reveals Wonner's humor, and skill in capturing the contradictions inherent in modern life.

PAINTING No. 5

Ocean Park No. 94

Artist: Richard Diebenkorn

Date: 1976

Paragraph: Richard Diebenkorn's Ocean Park series captures the atmosphere of Santa Monica, where the artist resided during this period of his work. A professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, Diebenkorn fused architectural elements with imagery of southern California's love of the open air and sea. Although abstract, paintings in the Ocean Park series like this one clearly capture the houses and condominiums that comprise the Santa Monica area. Panes of glass are rendered in white, but allow for the sense of refracted light, as the artist applies color in variable swathes. Moreover, Diebenkorn manages to convey the sense of peering out at the sea. A stained glass-like effect is evident, with structures of light and color.

PAINTING No. 6

Mick Jagger

Artist: Andy Warhol

Date: 1976

Paragraph: Perhaps more than any other artist in the 20th century, Andy Warhol blended pop and fine art into a cohesive whole. His social milieu included rock giants like Mick Jagger, who Warhol first met in the early 1960s, even before the Rolling Stones were world famous. In 1975, Warhol created a series of compositions by using a Polaroid image of the rock icon. Warhol made an enlarged transparency from the original Polaroid, then traced the image free hand. Using the free hand drawing as a basis for collage, Warhol then layered the image with crayon and glued colored paper on top before using a press. The result is quintessentially Warhol, in that it reinterprets and showcases popular culture.

PAINTING No. 7

Window

Artist: Richard Diebenkorn

Date: 1967

Paragraph: Throughout his career at Stanford, Richard Diebenkorn professed great admiration for Henri Matisse, and Window serves as an homage to the French impressionist. For example, Diebenkorn juxtaposes the starkly straight lines of the buildings outside with the curved lines of the chair and balcony. This serves also to create a thematic distinction between interior and exterior spaces. Diebenkorn's color palette in Window is likewise unique, with the terra cotta swath of color offering direct and tantalizing contrast to the azure of the California sky. The palette pays tribute to the light and color evident in the work of Matisse. Yet Diebenkorn's painting is far from derivative. Window does contain structural, color, and formal elements that are borrowed from Matisse but the presence of the metal folding chair lends a distinct atmosphere.