SOUND & IMAGE, an exhibition of current members of the Federation at Westbeth Gallery, February 3-24th.

 

The Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors presents Sound and Image,

an exhibition at the Westbeth Gallery on the theme of image and music.

In his On the Spiritual in Art, Kandinsky wrote: “Colour is the keyboard. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano with its many strings.”

Ever since Kandinsky likened paint to music, modernists have been thinking hard about the influential ways that visual art and music come together.

This exhibition explores the sounds of paint, ink and other media through the works of a group that has been an ensemble for 78 years and whose artists have been and still are fascinated by the coming together of two art forms. Founding member Mark Rothko’s son Christopher writes about his father: “Music was central to my father’s world—to his own aesthetic sensibilities, certainly, but also to the structure and expressive modes he found as a painter. I think it’s fair to say he was a painter who aspired to be a musician.”

Nicholas Christopher
House of the Rising Sun

This February 3-24, 2018, the Federation will be presenting ‘Sound & Image’ at the Westbeth Gallery, New York City.  29 Members will exhibit their work melding their art with the music that inspired them.  Throughout the gallery there will be interactive displays in which the viewer can immerse oneself in the visual presentation along with music playing on their mobile phone through the use of a QR scanner.

TO CARRY ON HIS FATHER’S TRADITION TO WORK IN A CREATIVE FIELD, ANDREW BOLOTOWSKY, ILYA’S SON, HAS PURSUED A MUSICAL CAREER.

Sunday, Feb. 11^th will bring Sound & Image to life with a flute performance by Andrew Bolotowsky, world renown flutist and son of Ilya, another Federation founder.  Andrew will give a brief talk about his father and then perform to the inspiration of the exhibition.  Other musicians will also perform between 4 pm – 6 pm that evening.

THE LRFA BLOG IS PLEASED TO FEATURE THREE OF THE CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS WHO WILL BE IN THE EXHIBIT BUT TO EXPERIENCE THE FULL IMPACT OF THE FEDERATION’S PRESENT ROSTER OF ARTISTS AND THEIR CREATIVITY, VISIT THE EXHIBITION AT WESTBETH GALLERY ON WEST STREET IN MANHATTAN.

Anneli Arms
Music Muse

ANNELI ARMS

Known internationally for sculpture and etching, it is her sculpture that sets her apart. By working with oversized creatures – human, marine and insect – she remarks distinctly on evolution, forcing the viewer to consider the beginning of future of humanity and his fears of both.  In time, the artist’s early paintings and relief works morphed into sculpture and gave birth to her “Human Creatures” and “Creature Creatures”.  None of the creatures, human or otherwise, are meant to be completely realistic. Instead, these parallel universes are individual and generic, seemingly modern and ancient at the same time.

http://www.anneliarms.com

Anneli Arms
Architect of His Dreams

JON SERVETAS

Jon Servetas
Oil on canvas

Jon Servetas started drawing as a child during WWll using poster paints and grocery bags from the market.
His work has evolved over the last 70+ years with the use of a warm color palette encapsulating everyday scenes.
His images are traditional in nature but are more of an impression of the scene with color taking over than true realism.

Jon Servetas

NICHOLAS CHRISTOPHER

My fascination has always been in taking the tool of the Impressionists and early compositional photographers and moving the photograph into the realm of ‘true art’. Working only outdoors with available light I capture the visual juxtaposition of the shadows that play within a compositional ‘color’ palette. Dimensionality or lack thereof is a product of this interplay. Dimension and shadow increase during the assembly process taking my 2 dimensional compositions and adding depth. Now light & shadow play a new role in creating a 3 dimensional finished work. The assembly rests on a wall, which is now also part of the paradigm.

www.nccworks.com

Nicholas Christopher
Mondrian Memory
mixed media

THE LRFA BLOG IS VERY PLEASED TO WELCOME GERI THOMAS IN OUR NEXT POST, THE FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL OF A FIRM SPECIALIZING IN RECRUITING AND PLACEMENT OF POSITIONS IN THE ARTS. GERI WILL SPEAK OF HER NEW CONSULTING AND TEACHING VENTURES AS WELL AS ISSUES OF DIVERSITY, EQUAL PAY AND DISCRIMINATION IN THE ARTS’ PROFESSIONS.

STAY TUNED!

A political purpose motivates the formation of The Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors

Dore Ashton

THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL TURBULENCE OF OUR CURRENT ERA IS CLEARLY REFLECTED IN THE WORK OF CONTEMPORARY ARTISTS. THIS IS A MOMENT OF GREAT UNREST AND DIVISIONISM BUT ONE THAT IS HARDLY UNIQUE TO OUR TIMES. A CHAMPION OF MODERN ART, DORE ASHTON, A RENOWNED ART HISTORIAN AND CRITIC OF HER TIME,  WROTE SOME OF THE EARLIEST AND MOST INSIGHTFUL HISTORIES OF ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM AND THE LEADING PAINTERS OF THE NEW YORK SCHOOL”.

DECEASED IN FEBRUARY 2017, MS. ASHTON WAS CLOSELY INVOLVED WITH THE SMALL WORLD OF ARTISTS WHO WERE DISCOVERING A NEW PICTORIAL LANGUAGE IN THE YEARS AFTER WORLD WAR II, BOTH AS A FRIEND OF WHAT ARE NOW CONSIDERED LEGENDARY ARTISTS, SUCH AS PHILIP GUSTON AND MARK ROTHKO, AND AS A WRITER FOR NUMEROUS PUBLICATIONS INCLUDING ART INTERNATIONAL, THE ART BULLETIN AND THE NEW YORK TIMES.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/03/arts/design/dore-ashton-art-critic-who-embraced-and-inhabited-modernism-dies-at-88.html

THUS, DORE ASHTON WAS THE PERFECT SPOKESPERSON FOR THE FEDERATION OF MODERN PAINTERS AND SCULPTORS, FOUNDED IN 1940 IN RESPONSE TO THE THE POLITICAL AND SOCIAL UPHEAVAL OF THE DEPRESSION AND THE THIRTIES.

George Constant
Still life, Petunias

 

The Federation had political aims when it was founded in New York by many of this country’s leading modernists.

“The Federation in Retrospect” – by Dore Ashton

Early in April, 1940, a New York Times headline announced: “17 Members Bolt Artists’ Congress.” Behind the headline lay a complex history of artistic, social and political upheavals rarely matched in the century. The imbroglios that led to the dramatic disruption of the Artists’ Congress also led, during the late Spring of 1940, to the establishment of a new group, The Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors, Inc., which would attempt to evade the debilitating conflicts inherent in the activities of the 1930’s.

During the few hectic years-roughly from 1934 to 1940-that artists’ groups had flourished, the world had visited upon them a series of hideous tremors that presaged the Second World War. Artists, like everyone else, responded strongly. The adjustments that external circumstances demanded in their lives counted for much in their groupings. With 1940 and the War, radically different adjustments needed to be made. According to one of the oldest living members of The Federation, George Constant, the largest purpose was, in its foundation, and is still, to keep artists together. “Other professions have their professional organizations,” he says, “so we should also. It’s a professional obligation.” Constant’s view of the enduring purpose of The Federation was certainly one of the factors in its founding. But it has evolved in its more than three decades of existence.Circumstance has shaped and modeled its destiny. In its origin, it was the identifiable offspring of the spirited controversies of the 1930s.

Stuart Davis
Owh! in San Pao

The economic debacle of the early 1930’s encouraged collective defense. Artists were not immune to the sweeping discontent that resulted, for instance, in the foundation of powerful labor unions. They fought for the right to benefit from New Deal relief programs. When the Federal Art Project’s WPA was well underway in 1935, artists flocked to its rolls. At the same time, they organized themselves professionally into groups such as the Artists’ Union, in 1935, whose purpose was “to unite artists in the struggle for economic security, and to encourage wider distribution and understanding of art.” Other grouping also appeared including the Artists Committee of Action. When the government seemed to be pulling away from its WPA commitments, these groups went on strike, held mass meetings and generally intervened in their society with tremendous energy. (In 1937, the Artists’ Union actually joined the CIO as Local 60, and the old urge for solidarity seemed at last to be satisfied.) These formations within American society were not to develop slowly and organically. The world was too much in disarray. Each dramatic event in Europe shook the foundations of American spiritual life, as World War II proved. In 1935 there was Mussolini’s conquest of Ethiopia; in 1936 the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War and Hitler’s arming the Rhineland; in 1937 the Moscow Trials; in 1938, Hitler annexed Austria; in 1939 he occupied Czechoslovakia and then signed a pact with Stalin; in 1940 Stalin invaded Finland. Each of these events evoked nervous responses in the United States.

Thomas Hart Benton
Strike

In February, 1936, at the American Artists’ Congress three-day meeting, hundreds of listeners heard Lewis Mumford exhort artists everywhere to form a united front against Fascist forces; the eminent painter Stuart Davis attack War, Fascism and Reaction. Artists increasingly felt the weight of the political disasters, and saw themselves in protagonists’ roles. Interpretations varied widely. There were passionate battles in various meetings. What can be said generally is that artists organized for the first time in the United States to experience professional solidarity and influence the events that impinged on their lives.

 

Reginald Marsh

In the particulars, there were numerous fundamental conflicts. To name only a few: a national urge for identity, answered by some artists in terms of what came to be called American Scene Painting, Social Realism, and Regionalism; and a concurrent desire on the part of other American artists to participate in the international modern movement, and to eschew chauvinist stances. On the ethical side, there were those whose belief in social revolution led them to subordinate their artistic independence, and there were those whose artistic ideals forbade political intrusions in the realm of art. The turmoil during the late 1930’s was immense. But somehow, the Artists’ Union and the American Artists’ Congress survived their internal griefs for several years.

Grant Wood

 

OPENING ON FEBRUARY 3rd, A GROUP EXHIBITION ENTITLED “SOUND AND IMAGE” COMPRISED OF 29 FEDERATION MEMBERS OPENS AT THE WESTBETH GALLERY, 463 WEST STREET, NEW YORK,  AND CONTINUES UNTIL FEBRUARY 24, 2018.

THE EXHIBITION EXPLORES THE SOUNDS OF PAINT, INK AND OTHER MEDIA AND INCLUDES MUSIC EVENTS ON FEBRUARY 11th and FEBRUARY 24th.  MORE DETAILS TO FOLLOW IN OUR NEXT LRFA BLOG POST!

VISIT THE EXHIBITION AND SEE WHAT THE CURRENT MEMBERS OF FEDART ARE DOING.

 

Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors, founded in the WPA era, and alive and active today

DURING ITS YEARS OF OPERATION, THE GOVERNMENT-FUNDED FEDERAL ART PROJECT (FAP) OF THE WORKS PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION (WPA) HIRED HUNDREDS WHO COLLECTIVELY CREATED MORE THAN 100,000 PAINTINGS AND MURALS AND OVER 18,000 SCULPTURES FOR MUNICIPAL BUILDINGS, SCHOOLS AND HOSPITAL. THE FAP WAS PART OF PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT’S NEW DEAL DURING THE GREAT DEPRESSION THAT SOUGHT TO PUT AS MANY UNEMPLOYED AMERICANS BACK TO WORK AND BUOY MORALE.

IN THIS SOCIAL AND POLITICAL POST-DEPRESSION CLIMATE, ONE OF THE MOST LONG-LASTING AND ACTIVE ARTISTS’ ORGANIZATIONS, FOUNDED IN NEW YORK CITY IN 1940, THAT EMERGED IS THE FEDERATION OF MODERN PAINTERS AND SCULPTORS. WHILE THE WPA FAVORED MORE TRADITIONAL FORMS OF ART, NARRATIVE AND PORTRAITURE, THE FEDERATION OF MODERN PAINTERS AND SCULPTORS SUPPORTS ARTISTS WHOSE WORK IS ALSO ABSTRACT, GEOMETRIC AND MORE EXPERIMENTAL IN NATURE. OUR TRAVEL EXPERT, NICHOLAS CHRISTOPHER WHO HEADS TURON TRAVEL CATERING TO INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL FOR ARTISTS, ART FAIRS AND ART DESTINATIONS, IS A SERIOUS ARTIST AND A MEMBER OF THE FEDERATION.

THE LRFA BLOG IS VERY PLEASED TO WELCOME NICHOLAS BACK, WEARING HIS ARTIST’S HAT (BERET?),TO TELL US OF THE HISTORY, PRESENT AND FUTURE OF THE FEDERATION.

https://www.fedart.org/

Promote the welfare of free progressive artists working in America; to strive to protect the artists’ general and cultural interests and to facilitate the showing of their work; and to take legitimate action in furtherance of such purpose.

MISSION STATEMENT, FEDERATION OF MODERN PAINTERS AND SCULPTORS, JUNE 19, 1940

Mark Rothko
Sacrificial Moment, 1945
National Gallery of Art, Washington

The Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors, founded 1940, emerged from a very energetic period of post WPA American History during which every working group of like-minded professionals created Unions, Associations & Federations, a multiple of political and quasi-political organizations.

It was both through creative and political crossroads that the Federation was formed, taking their cues from the Federation des Artistes, founded in 1871 by Courbet, Pottier Daumier and Manet.  Both historic periods were filled with opposing political and cultural forces, which needed to be addressed by the art world.

Milton Avert
Gaspe Pink Sky , 1940

Founded by Mark Rothko, Adoph Gottlieb, Milton Avery, Meyer Shapiro & Ilya Bolotowski, to name a few of the early members.  The purpose of the Federation is to ‘.. promote the cultural interests of free progressive artists working in America and to facilitate the showing of their work.’  This artistic ensemble measures the merit of the artists’ work, not encumbered by past or present trends or definitions.

 

Ilya Boltowsky
Abstraction, 1940

For over 70 years the Federation of Modern Painters & Sculptors has maintained these principles.  Allowing for a free and fluid expression of each member’s work.

Now is its 78^th years the Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors maintains a very active presence in the art world, while always being nurtured by its history.

THE NEXT LRFA POST FOCUSES ON THE HISTORY OF THE FOUNDATION,  WRITTEN BY THE GREAT POET/CRITIC DORE ASHTON.

WESTBETH’S ARTISTS’ HOUSING WAS CONCEIVED IN THE 1960s AS A PARTIAL SOLUTION TO THE ACUTE NEED TO PROVIDE AFFORDABLE HOUSING AND STUDIOS FOR ARTISTS AND THEIR FAMILIES. HOW APPROPRIATE THAT WESTBETH GALLERY WILL HOST THE NEXT EXHIBITION OF MEMBERS OF THE FEDERATION OF MODERN PAINTERS AND SCULPTORS.

THE EXHIBITION IS ENTITLED SOUND AND IMAGE  FEATURING WORKS BY CURRENT MEMBERS OF THE FEDERATION ON THE THEME OF IMAGE AND MUSIC.

MORE TO FOLLOW!