The Farnsworth is pleased to present Achieving American Art: Fifty Years of Change and Challenge, the third installment in this popular, annual lecture series. The 2010 course will focus on the art of the nation from 1945 to the present. The series will be divided into three sections by media (painting and drawing, architecture and photography) and will be presented by Farnsworth staff members and guest speakers from museums and colleges. The Farnsworth’s Director of Education Roger Dell will host the series, providing an introduction for each guest lecturer’s presentation. The same ninety-minute lecture will be offered twice every Wednesday (10 a.m. and 5:30 p.m.) at The Strand Theatre in Rockland.

 

Artist as Oedipus: How Artists of the 50’s and 60’s Revolted Against Abstract Expressionism
Lecture by Farnsworth Director of Education Roger Dell

The first truly American art style, Abstract Expressionism, was forged by a handful of artists living and working in lower Manhattan in the late 1940’s and early 50’s. They became stars of the art firmament, although in short order their successors began to overthrow their fundamental ideas—and the art world went Pop!

In the early 1950s, New York City painters such as James Brooks, Alex Katz, and Charles DuBack first began to summer in Maine. They brought with them a variety of modernist styles from pure abstraction to figuration. This lecture will explore their impact on the local art scene and their role in stimulating other New York modernists who soon followed in their footprint.

April 14
Why Drawing Matters Now