Marcel Dzama is another example of an artist whose work I was already familiar with, without knowing it (I love They Might Be Giants and Beck). I love how they look like vintage drawings from books like Dick and Jane. Primers that my parents read when they were little. They vintage quality is so lovely and appealing, yet interestingly his work is sort of grim and shocking. He was born and raised in Canada, but like so many artist, he moved to New York to live and work as an artist. He works in many different mediums; film, collage, watercolor, pen and ink, and sculpture. I've created a piece that reminds me a lot of the way he works. It's a retro looking picture of perfection, a woman serving her friends a luncheon, but if you really look at it, there are so many things wrong or off about the picture that make you want to understand what is going on in the scene and also wha tis going on in the artist's brain. That is how I feel about his work- I want to know where these interesting and frightening stories and scenes come from.
Self Portrait, 1996 George Tooker was talented from a young age and was privileged enough to be able to start taking art lessons from a famous artist, Malcolm Fraser, at the age of 7. He was born on Long Island in 1920. Twenty two years later he had graduated from Harvard with a graduate degree in English literature. His studies into the renaissance and medieval painting seems to have deeply influenced his artwork. He served for a short period of time in the Marines and when he came home after an injury, he delved back into the world of art, meeting many people who would be influential in the path of the rest of his life. Particularly, Jared and Margaret French and Paul Cadmus who mentored him and helped him to find his style that he was known for, which can be termed as magic realism (he never really liked this term). He had other friends who encouraged him to travel. He spent 6 months traveling Europe, visiting museums, historical sites, and churches. Once again, these friends
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