be an artist
John McCracken is playing with viewing.
We see a bush and a branch in the mirror. We also see a bush in the background. The two bushes blend together. The two pictures are one composition.
At the same time you see what’s in front and what’s behind you. John McCracken let’s you juggle with shape, color and space. You can choose yourself the position of the mirror by moving to the left, right, up or down. Together with John McCracken your are an artist.
By Theo, www.artatsite.com
Vertaling
wees de kunstenaar
John McCracken speelt met kijken.
In de spiegel zien we een struik en een tak. Op de achtergrond zie je ook een struik. De beide struiken lopen in elkaar over. De twee afbeeldingen zijn een compositie.
Je ziet op hetzelfde moment hetgeen voor je en achter je ligt. John McCracken laat je goochelen met vorm, kleur en ruimte. Je kunt zelf de positie van de gespiegelde afbeelding beïnvloeden door links, rechts, hoger of lager te bewegen. Je bent tezamen met John McCracken de kunstenaar.
Door Theo, www.artatsite.com
www.davidzwirner.com:
John McCracken occupies a singular position in the recent history of American art with work that melds the restrained formal qualities of Minimalist sculpture with a distinctly West Coast sensibility expressed through color, form, and finish.
www.artnet.com:
'My works are minimal and reduced, but also maximal,' the artist has said of his work. 'I try to make them concise, clear statements in three-dimensional form, and also to take them to a breathtaking level of beauty.'
www.artsy.net:
Working with what he called 'planks,' John McCracken created Minimalist sculptures that bridge the material world with the metaphysical. By leaning the planks against the wall, McCracken’s intention was to connect the spheres of two-dimensional painting and three-dimensional sculpture.
His method involved a laborious process of painting, sanding, and polishing the polyester resin on each plywood board to achieve a flawless patina that looks machine-made, brithe 1960s West Coast 'Finish Fetish Art' aesthetic. The most dramatic effect of his glossy surfaces is the way they become as reflective as mirrors and oftentimes seem to disappear altogether, such as in his 1985 work Akitanai.
'My tendency,' McCracken once said, 'is to reduce or develop everything to 'single things'—things which refer to nothing outside [themselves] but which at the same time possibly refer, or relate, to everything.'
In Memoriam: John McCracken (1934–2011) by Dr. Marc Straus:
PLANK
(1934–2011)
I bend my bone against the plane. It is as if
I am leaning and the plank is straight. The blue resin
is the color of my veins and the red
is my hair.
There is a hill I remember from childhood, brown
and spare with a single majestic pine that had
no business being there but then nothing could be
the same without it.
I think about that pine, I think about sitting beneath it
and feeling as though now it’s just the two of us
is like that.
How everything might be simplified and how
I am only a few molecules amongst so many
others. Some day scatter me and leave
a couple of planks behind.
www.wikipedia.org:
John Harvey McCracken (December 9, 1934 – April 8, 2011) was a minimalist artist. He lived and worked in Los Angeles, Santa Fe, New Mexico, and New York.
While experimenting with increasingly three-dimensional canvases, McCracken began to produce art objects made with industrial techniques and materials, plywood, sprayed lacquer, pigmented resin, creating the ever more minimalistic works featuring highly-reflective, smooth surfaces. He applied techniques akin to those used in surfboard construction—popular in Southern California.
Later McCracken was part of the Light and Space movement that includes James Turrell, Peter Alexander, Larry Bell, Robert Irwin Noni Grevillea and others. In interviews, however, he usually cited his greatest influences as the hard edge woof the Abstract Expressionist Barnett Newman and Minimalists like Donald Judd, Dan Flavin and Carl Andre.
In McCracken's work, color was also used as "material." Bold solid colors with their highly polished finish reflect the unique California light or mirror the observer in a way that takes the work into another dimension. His palette included bubble-gum pink, lemon yellow, deep sapphire and ebony, usually applied as a monochrome. Sometimes an application of multiple colors marbleizes or runs down the sculpture's surface, like a molten lava flow.
John McCracken is playing with viewing.
We see a bush and a branch in the mirror. We also see a bush in the background. The two bushes blend together. The two pictures are one composition.
At the same time you see what’s in front and what’s behind you. John McCracken let’s you juggle with shape, color and space. You can choose yourself the position of the mirror by moving to the left, right, up or down. Together with John McCracken your are an artist.
By Theo, www.artatsite.com
Vertaling
wees de kunstenaar
John McCracken speelt met kijken.
In de spiegel zien we een struik en een tak. Op de achtergrond zie je ook een struik. De beide struiken lopen in elkaar over. De twee afbeeldingen zijn een compositie.
Je ziet op hetzelfde moment hetgeen voor je en achter je ligt. John McCracken laat je goochelen met vorm, kleur en ruimte. Je kunt zelf de positie van de gespiegelde afbeelding beïnvloeden door links, rechts, hoger of lager te bewegen. Je bent tezamen met John McCracken de kunstenaar.
Door Theo, www.artatsite.com
www.davidzwirner.com:
John McCracken occupies a singular position in the recent history of American art with work that melds the restrained formal qualities of Minimalist sculpture with a distinctly West Coast sensibility expressed through color, form, and finish.
www.artnet.com:
'My works are minimal and reduced, but also maximal,' the artist has said of his work. 'I try to make them concise, clear statements in three-dimensional form, and also to take them to a breathtaking level of beauty.'
www.artsy.net:
Working with what he called 'planks,' John McCracken created Minimalist sculptures that bridge the material world with the metaphysical. By leaning the planks against the wall, McCracken’s intention was to connect the spheres of two-dimensional painting and three-dimensional sculpture.
His method involved a laborious process of painting, sanding, and polishing the polyester resin on each plywood board to achieve a flawless patina that looks machine-made, brithe 1960s West Coast 'Finish Fetish Art' aesthetic. The most dramatic effect of his glossy surfaces is the way they become as reflective as mirrors and oftentimes seem to disappear altogether, such as in his 1985 work Akitanai.
'My tendency,' McCracken once said, 'is to reduce or develop everything to 'single things'—things which refer to nothing outside [themselves] but which at the same time possibly refer, or relate, to everything.'
In Memoriam: John McCracken (1934–2011) by Dr. Marc Straus:
PLANK
(1934–2011)
I bend my bone against the plane. It is as if
I am leaning and the plank is straight. The blue resin
is the color of my veins and the red
is my hair.
There is a hill I remember from childhood, brown
and spare with a single majestic pine that had
no business being there but then nothing could be
the same without it.
I think about that pine, I think about sitting beneath it
and feeling as though now it’s just the two of us
How everything might be simplified and how
I am only a few molecules amongst so many
others. Some day scatter me and leave
a couple of planks behind.
www.wikipedia.org:
John Harvey McCracken (December 9, 1934 – April 8, 2011) was a minimalist artist. He lived and worked in Los Angeles, Santa Fe, New Mexico, and New York.
While experimenting with increasingly three-dimensional canvases, McCracken began to produce art objects made with industrial techniques and materials, plywood, sprayed lacquer, pigmented resin, creating the ever more minimalistic works featuring highly-reflective, smooth surfaces. He applied techniques akin to those used in surfboard construction—popular in Southern California.
Later McCracken was part of the Light and Space movement that includes James Turrell, Peter Alexander, Larry Bell, Robert Irwin Noni Grevillea and others. In interviews, however, he usually cited his greatest influences as the hard edge woof the Abstract Expressionist Barnett Newman and Minimalists like Donald Judd, Dan Flavin and Carl Andre.
In McCracken's work, color was also used as "material." Bold solid colors with their highly polished finish reflect the unique California light or mirror the observer in a way that takes the work into another dimension. His palette included bubble-gum pink, lemon yellow, deep sapphire and ebony, usually applied as a monochrome. Sometimes an application of multiple colors marbleizes or runs down the sculpture's surface, like a molten lava flow.