Charles Demuth
|
OF AMERICAN PAINTERS affected by the cubists' revolt, the most elegant and perhaps the most gifted was Charles Demuth ( 1883- 1935), born in Lancaster, Pa., to an old and affluent family in whose house he spent much of his life, often tormented by illness but also needing, for psychological reasons, his birthplace's atmosphere of permanence and sanctuary. But he was not a recluse. On the contrary, his friends knew him as esthete, dandy and gourmet, fond of travel and public places, especially nightclubs and the theatre. Nevertheless, his art is essentially private, even secret; it stems from an aristocratic withdrawal of spirit which left him free to comment sharply, and with remarkable originality and skill, on subjects from life and literature that interested him deeply. He was most at ease with watercolor, a medium whose requirements of delicacy and precision suited his slender, firm hands.
Two trips to Paris before World War I gave him the basic ingredients of his style--cubism as to form, and the impact of such divergent masters as El Greco, Watteau, Fragonard, Blake, the Japanese printmakers, Lautrec and Beardsley in questions of designs. In his figure pieces (which are quite likely his greatest works), he often used Mannerist distortions of contour and tensions of pose. His still lifes of flowers, vegetables and fruit, on the other hand, are sometimes presented as though seen imbedded in the most flawless ice, glistening and hypnotically quiet. And when he painted architectural scenes, he was not ashamed to include romantic-atmospheric effects, laced taut by cubism's grammar and his own impeccable taste. He was fond of paradox and irony, and therefore inevitably became a friend of Marcel Duchamp during the war years in New York. Though never a Dadaist in an official sense, his temperament was mocking. detached--and extraordinarily alert. Our country has produced many artist more powerful than he. It has produced none more rate in perception and control of vision.
Demuth: [Comparing his own and John Marin's debt to modern French art] He brought his up in buckets and spilt much along the way. I dipped mine out with a teaspoon but I never spilled a drop.
|
||
This website is created and designed by Atlantis International, 2006
This is an unofficial website with educational purpose. All pictures, and trademarks are the property of their respective owners and may not be reproduced for any reason whatsoever. If proper notation of owned material is not given please notify us so we can make adjustments. No copyright infringement is intended.
