Clip & save: John Marin (1870-1953), movement -

Clip & save: John Marin (1870-1953), movement -- pertaining to Deer Isle, Maine -- The harbor I, 1927. Watercolor and pencil on paper; 16 5/8" x 22 1/4". The Metropolitan Musuem of Art, New York. (Art Notes)(Cover Story). the artist John Marin John Marin (December 23, 1870 - October 2, 1953) born in Rutherford, New Jersey was an early American modernist artist. Known for his abstract landscapes and watercolors. Biography (1870-1953) spent most of his childhood in Weehawken,N.J. His first pictures showed the area near where he lived, includingviews of New York City New York City:see New York, city. New York CityCity (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. just across the Hudson River Hudson RiverRiver, New York, U.S. Originating in the Adirondack Mountains and flowing for about 315 mi (507 km) to New York City, it was named for Henry Hudson, who explored it in 1609. Dutch settlement of the Hudson valley began in 1629. . He was always to beseen with a pad and pencil in his hand, working in his own personalstyle. Marin had an intense love of personal liberty and his art shows auniquely American vision of the world. No other Expressionist artist hasever been quite like him. John Marin was mainly self-taught. He worked as an architect untilhe was 28 but was not satisfied by that kind of work. By that time hisfamily had finally accepted that he was going to be a painter. In 1901,at age 31, he attended art school in Philadelphia before going to Parisfor six years. During the time he was in Europe, Marin searched for astyle of painting that best suited him and worked for a while in thestyles of each of the major art movements ''See Art periods for a chronological list.This is a list of art movements. These terms, helpful for curricula or anthologies, evolved over time to group artists who are often loosely related. of the time--Impressionism,Fauvism fauvism(fō`vĭzəm)[Fr. fauve=wild beast], name derisively hurled at and cheerfully adopted by a group of French painters, including Matisse, Rouault, Derain, Vlaminck, Friesz, Marquet, van Dongen, Braque, and Dufy. and Cubism--before discovering the spontaneous Expressioniststyle he used for the rest of his life. On his return to the United States, Marin went to live in New YorkCity and made the city the subject of his art. The paintings, drawingsand prints made during this time captured the turbulent life of thegreat city during a period of prosperity and rapid growth. During thesummers, however, he went to Maine and to New Mexico, where he paintedscenes of wild coastlines and desert wilderness. Wilderness and ocean themes increasingly inspired him andeventually he took his family away from New York New York, state, United StatesNew York,Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of . He made his home onthe coast of Maine and, for the next 40 years, he painted the sea, thecoastline, the villages and towns, and, above all, the weather that heloved so well. Throughout his long life, John Marin's art continually changedas he restlessly experimented with fresh ideas. For him, everything hesaw was full of rhythm and he was driven to get his feelings down asquickly as he could. In doing so, he dismissed whatever was notessential. As a result, he used fewer and fewer brushstrokes in hispaintings. The example he set for younger artists helped in developingyet another "ism," Abstract Expressionism. this painting Only a handful of artists have ever used transparent watercolors astheir chosen medium. John Marin is one of them. He experimented withother mediums, such as oil paint and etching, but most of his best workwas done with watercolors. This was probably because watery paint flowsquickly and enabled him to work rapidly. Also, watercolor paints aresmall and easy to carry around, which permitted him to take hisequipment with him wherever he went. The state of Maine has a gray, rocky coast and many of thebuildings are constructed of local stone, while others are wooden andusually painted white. Further, the weather there is often foggy andskies are cloudy. In this painting, Marin describes a rainy day with lowclouds making a kind of roof over the village. Marin's choice of colors should be no surprise. He enjoyed themainly soft gray colors seen in this painting. They matched much of theweather he found in Maine. In this picture, most of the scene was painted using rapidbrushstrokes. His viewpoint, high above the village and harbor, allowedhim to paint the buildings as a jumble of shapes to which a few detailswere added in places. As a result, the fishing village looks more like acollection of angular patterns rather than an attempt to show what theplace looked like. Similar but bolder angular lines were used throughout the painting,especially in the low clouds that hang over the scene. The emphasis inthe sky is placed on the sharply drawn diagonal lines which tell us thatheavy rain showers are happening. Marin frequently painted rainstorms and eventually showed them ashe does here, in a kind of artistic shorthand. He once remarked that alllife is made beautiful by those wet days. Like many others of hispaintings, Marin enclosed this one with a jaggedly painted frame, inkeeping with the brushwork brush��work?n.1. Work done with a brush.2. The manner in which a painter applies paint with a brush.brushworkNoun used in the picture, itself.