Saturday, January 17, 2009

RIP: A Man of Pictures ...

Another death of note this past week, was an artist whose work struck a special chord among those of us who have walked the hills and forest of southeatern Pennsylvania ...

... and to millions of others who didn't, but embraced his images nonetheless.

"Artist Andrew Wyeth, who portrayed the hidden melancholy of the people and landscapes of Pennsylvania’s Brandywine Valley and coastal Maine in works such as “Christina’s World,” died early Friday. He was 91 ..."
Read the rest of the story from MSNBC and AP

Wyeth (at right, in a file photo from the Brandywine River Museum) was one of the best-known U.S. artists of the mid-20th century. And while there those who dismissed his work as more illustration than art, others called him the "Painter of the People" due to his work's popularity with the American public.

A realist, there was little of the abstract in Wyeth's work. His most common subjects were the land and people around him, especially in the more rural areas that can still be found an hour's drive or so from downtown Philly. His was a long and productive life and career, that continued right up to the present.

More on this man and his art can be found at his website, which makes for a wonderful, virtual visit. But if you ever get a chance to actually visit southeast P-A ... then GO!

2 comments:

Pancho said...

Stop in at the Wyeth-Hurd Gallery in San Patricio NM [on the way to Ruidoso] and you can probably catch, and talk with, his nephew Michael Hurd.

Jeff said...

Thanks for stopping in, and for the recommendation, my friend. I certainly will! Like the Wyeths, the Hurds are another family of artists whose talent spanned the generations.