The artwork is less like a noun and more like a verb…
-Martin Facey, speaking of Richard Diebenkorn’s work
-All images photos of works by Richard Diebenkorn, 1950-1952
(from the San Jose Museum of Art website)
On June 2 the University of New Mexico Harwood Museum of Art in Taos will open “Diebenkorn in New Mexico,” an exhibit of 50+ paintings and drawings Richard Diebenkorn made during the two years he lived in the state. This particular grouping hasn’t been viewed together since 1951. A book by the same name will be released with the exhibit.
Diebenkorn came to UNM’s graduate art program on the GI Bill in 1950. He came, it’s said, for the landscape and the notion he could be in a place where his work would be “unencumbered.” Diebenkorn gained national recognition in the late 1960s, while living and teaching in California, and today is one of the most prominent American artists of the 20th century.
Martin Facey, a UNM art professor who studied with Diebenkorn and then later became his studio assistant, said this of Diebenkorn: “The artwork is less like a noun and more like a verb, so you can see the artwork in time…It’s more like a performance than making work that’s static in time. In much work, I’d say even to this day, I try to mimic the approach–not the style per se, but the idea that the act of painting is a search and a transformative process.”
I loved this quote, tying art to words. It made me wonder if in my own writing and drawing whether I’m more concerned with the end result than the transformative process.
In case you can’t make it to Taos, the exhibit will be shown at the San Jose Museum of Art October 15-January 6, and the Grey Art Gallery at New York University January 23-April 15.
NOTE: UNM’s Mirage Magazine has a story about Diebenkorn and the exhibit in its Spring issue, but as of today the link on that story leads you to something unrelated.
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