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1987 Janet Fish: Paintings and Drawings Since 1975 University of Richmond Museums
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Recommended Citation University of Richmond Museums. Janet Fish: Paintings and Drawings Since 1975, September 10 to October 03, 1987, Marsh Art Gallery, University of Richmond Museums. Richmond, Virginia: University of Richmond Museums, 1987. Exhibition Brochure.
This Book is brought to you for free and open access by the University Museums at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Exhibition Brochures by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. JANET FISH LENDERS TO THE EXHIBITION Janet Fish Robert Miller Gallery, New York Don and Jennifer Carter Dolores and Stanley Feldman PaineWebber Group, lnc. Lois Farfel Stark
The Marsh Gallery exhibition is made possible by the generosity of Joel Harnett, RC '45, and the Cultural Affairs Committee, University of Richmond.
© 1987 University of Richmond
COVER: Geography. 1984 JANET FISH Paintings and Drawings Since 1975
September 10-0ctober 3, 1987
Exhibition organized by Susanne Arnold with an essay by Robert C. Morgan
Marsh Gallery Modlin Fine Arts Center University of Richmond Rrd Cups a11d Tulips, 198 1
2 concerns and to the arts. The 1979 recipient of the Her paintings of the early '70s, in which she ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Gotham Human Relations Award for civic leader combined realistic subjects with an abstract ship, Harnett is a poet and, with his wife Lila, a handling of paint, established her career. Yet, as The greatest pleasure of working on this exhibition collector of fine art. this exhibition reveals, over the last twelve years has come from getting to know artist Janet Fish. Harnett's belief that art should be a part of the she has taken progressively more risks with color She has responded with enthusiasm and full essential spirit of the University led him four years and composition as well as with the integration of cooperation and made our trip to New York for her ago to endow the opening exhibition of each Marsh the figure. For example, Fourth ofJuly (1985), interview a success. We appreciate the studio time Gallery season. He envisioned bringing to this unleashes all the possibilities of color and intricacy she has graciously given up to help with exhibition campus major American artists whose work and that are restrained and unexplored in her studies of arrangements. whose presence would stimulate, provoke, enrich glasses in the '70s. Additionally, the deep illusionis We gratefully acknowledge the time, effort and and inform students, faculty and the community at tic space and narrative allusion in Waiting for Will resources of the Robert Miller Gallery, and we large. Harnett's vision has been in trumental in (1986) severs Fish's tie with Modernism. appreciate the many hours Nathan Kernan spent enhancing the educational impact of the gallery Although Fish's paintings may be loosely placed on this show's behalf. and of the Art Department both on campus and off. within the category of Realism-the cool, objective The paintings in this exhibition are on loan from Thus, we extend our deepest and most sincere representation of the material world-they resist both public and private collections. We are in thanks to Joel Harnett, without whose continued such tidy indexing. The tour de force of Fish's work debted to the lenders; without their support this vision and generosity this annual event cou ld not is her personal response to her subjects. Her exhibition would not be a major statement. have taken place. sensory perceptions thus yield a beauty and joie de We are grateful to Robert Morgan and Lisa vivre that ultimately dominate the paintings. Pesko for their valuable contributions. Special thanks go to Richard Papale of Burton, Susanne Arnold Skira & Co. Ltd., for the generous loan of cata Director logue material, and to Jae Drewett, whose printing Marsh Gallery expertise and friendship have been invaluable. INTRODUCTION For the sponsorship of Janet Fish's visit and The Marsh Gallery takes pride in opening its Gerrit Henry's lecture we are indebted to the 1987-88 season with the first Virginia exhibition of University's Cultural Affairs Committee and the paintings and drawings by Janet Fish, acknow J. Thomas Lecture Fund. ledged master of the contemporary still life Special thanks also go to Dr. Charles Johnson according to art critic Gerrit Henry. and Dr. Sheldon Wettack for their continued While this exhibition is intended to emphasize interest and support of this project, and to Dorothy her current work it is also slightly retrospective, Wagener, for her assistance in the catalogue including work dating from 1975 to 1987, so that production. To Lorraine Brevig, Kevin Ball and the viewer will understand the progression as well Eileen Walker, a personal thanks for their invalu as the increasing depth of the artist's oeuvre. able assistance. In the midst of a "postmodern" era, hype and novelty sell art. Even so, Janet Fish's work stands As we acknowledge the unique vision of artist apart from these sensibilities by its quiet integrity Janet Fish it is important that we also acknowledge and technical brilliance. Undaunted by the dogma the person whose vision brought her here: Joel W. of pure abstraction which reigned in her formative Harnett. Harnett graduated Phi Beta Kappa from years, Janet Fish connected with images in the real the University of Richmond in 1945. Multi world. Rooted in the Modernist formal tradition dimensional, he is not only a successful business and the Dutch still life genre tradition, her work man-President and Chairman of the Board of adheres to the world of concrete contemporary Media Horizons Inc., the world's largest publisher experience. Fish's simple, familiar subjects are in the field of visual communications-he is also rendered with formal complexity, richness of detail deeply committed to civic and humanitarian and the vibrant, tropical palette of her childhood.
L ______paints away from the school and went and sat in Q Who gave you your first show? this graveyard and started painting very brushy INTERVIEW A The first was in a cooperative gallery that soon landscapes. I felt much more connected to that. folded because we all fought. Then I joined WITH JANET FISH And I started to look at the California Imagists, another co-op called "55 Mercer Street," and I such as David Park. This was a kind of rea]jst BY LISA PESKO, WC '87 had a show there. Later, Jill Kornblee came painting that came out of abstraction. Then I down and saw some of my paintings during my Q just stopped listening to everybody and every What made you want to become an artist? Did show at Mercer Street and l began to show at body stopped talking to me. During my final you gel support from anyone or did you just do it? Kornblee Gallery. That was my first commercial year in art school I was getting very little gallery. A An artist wasn't a surprising or unusual thing to feedback. The critics were coming in and talking want to be, because there were many artists in to. me ~bo~t anything rather than trying to deal Q Was it run !Jy a woman? my family. My grandfather, Clark Vorhees, was with this girt who's painting flowers. Because an Impressionist landscape painter, my uncle when I came back and couldn't paint landscapes A Yes, and she carried more women in that gallery was a sculptor and my mother is a sculptor. As l ?et up .still lifes to create a landscape space. So than any other gallery in New York. It was a child, I .would always say that I was going to I Just pamted, and tried to find out what I unusual. There are very few galleries that have be an artist, whatever that meant. Then I thought painting was. more than two women in them, even now. wanted to go to art school, but my family Once I left school, I moved to New York. I wanted me to go to college. So I chose Smith Q Do you think your recognition during the '70s didn't know anyone; I just stuck to my work. I has helped other women artists? which had the most varied art department of' ~egan to paint potatoes and lemons ~d things any of the schools to which I applied. I started like that as an exercise to learn volumes. That A The more women who are recognized the more out wanting to be a sculptor until I got to Yale got m~ LJ:terested in another way of organizing possible it is for other women to be seen. I had and didn't like the sculpture department. At the pamtmg. And one thing led to another. a fortunate career that way. Also, my work has Yale, under Joseph Albers, they were doing all not been tied so much to what was in fasruon. this pure Bauhaus stuff, and that was not what I Q Can you explain that further? Still life as "genre" painting was always looked wanted to do. So I studjed painting. A Well, what I hadn't been taught at Yale was how down on. A number of women paint stilt life and are very good at it. I believe that because Q What directed you toward realism? Wasn't to ~aint rea]jstically, so when I started painting Abstract Expressionism the thing to be doing? an unage I came at it fresh, because no one had women have been ignored it has, in some ways, told me how to look at it. A lot of representa made them free to paint whatever they wanted. A It was and I did it. Abstract Expressionism was There are a lot of paintings by women that are ~onal painters have systems for looking; I'm not pretty well formulated by then and I learned alt mterested in that. I paint because of the somewhat off the beaten path. kinds of things to think about when making excitement of finding out things that I don't Q How did you learn to use color? abstract paintings, such as maintaining the know. I don't have a rule for how to draw or picture plane and "push, pull." Finally, I was how to mix colors or anything that would stand A When I first came to New York , I got a job in an sitting there trying to paint these pictures and I between me and seeing. art store where I could buy paint for a big felt no connection to the painting. What 1 was discount. I got one of every tube. It was a great doing was arranging paint. Growing up around Q You emerged at a time when not many women lesson in color. ln school I had taken the Albers' artists, I had an idea about art and the life of an were in that vocation, which was traditionally color course, which djdn't have anything to do artist. I thought of it in a quixotic sense as a male. Was that difficult? with mixing paint. I tried to decide how what I way of living that was personally meaningful, A There were lots of problems. I think that back was seeing related to the ideas I had brought rather than as a career. Abstract Expressionisn then, and now too, women didn't get the same from abstraction. I got a lot of energy from djdn't mean anything to me. It was a set of respect. A woman has to be much better than looking at different kinds of paintings and rules. It was these other voices telling me what everybody else to be even considered half as reworking the ideas that I saw there. I worked painting "was." good. Art is a very insecure field. A number of in a reductive way, eliminating everything that I Then I went to Skowhegan Summer Art galleries were fairly outspoken about not was not inte.rested in, and constructing paintings School. This was a crisis period for me. Alex wanting a woman, so trying to find a gallery was out of what mterested me. At first this was Katz was a visiting critic and he said, "Why difficult. volumes defined by light. which then led to don't you just relax-go out and paint the working with the play of light on plastic-wrapped landscape or something." So I did. I took my
4 Tolly and Clairr Rmdmf.{, 1984
5 fruit, and then to light contained in glass. Each time new ideas developed in an organic and progressive way. Q What about the introduction in the '70s of architectural elements in your paintings? A I brought the architecture in when I moved to this studio, because that was the point when I felt that I had gone as far as I could with the "glass" imagery. First I started to bring in flowers. Gradually I added objects that weren't glass like the architecture. I was looking for a totally active canvas. To use landscape was good because there was all that flicker of forms to play with. Q How did you develop such astute observation? A It came from focusing. You see what you are looking for. Q What kinds of things are you looking for now that you weren't looking for earlier? A I'm really working more with ideas about the orchestration of movement and light through the painting. Where previously 1 had worked with a frontal image, now I'm working with a deeper space and with figures. I'm taking these images and finding out if there is a way of approaching them that is new for me. The light is the consistent thread, but instead of the light being contained in bottles, now the light is contained in the environment. When I put the figure in, I'm painting it not only as a volume, but also as part of the environment. The image is as much subject matter as the paint, choice of color or brush stroke. AU these elements are locked together to make the painting. Part of the problem of bringing the figure into the painting is that people will see it first. Q Did you have to change your technique or method Twoft1.U:e and One Cheese. 1975 of painting when you brought in the figure? A I didn't change my painting technique when I added the figure but I have had to sketch more. When I started to work with the figure, the first two paintings were more posed and more static. The whole purpose of bringing the figure in was
6 that I wanted movement. To achieve that I work out the composition from Polaroids, cutting them up to get the poses and movement I want. Then I have the people pose again to fix proportions. To make the painting of the figure quicker, I paint the body in parts so that it isn't necessary for the subject to be present once the pose is sketched in. Q What do you want the viewer to get from your paintings? A I'm not looking to tell much of a story. I really don't trunk that's what you get from painting. What you get from painting is the experience of seeing. The message of painting comes from color and movement. When you go to a museum you just walk by, so a painting really has to grab and hold you for awhile. I would also like to have enough there that if someone came back to the painting there would be a surprise for them, that they could spend time with the painting. Q Ifyou're not telling a story, what are your paintings about? A The subject is the light and the way it moves around within the still life. What I'm trying to do in all of my paintings is create a reality, which is defined by those elements that I trunk make something seem alive. It is a kind of energy that I see in things. Q What direction do you see your work going in the future? A I don't ever worry about where my work is going to go. lf someone is devoting intelligence and attention to their work it's going to get better. A work of art is as good as the energy that's put into it.
This interview was conducted by Lisa Pesko on April 9, 1987. in Janet Fish's studio in New York City. Lisa graduated from the University of Richmond's Westhampton CoUege last spring with a B.A. degree in Art History. Lisa's trip to the city to conduct this interview, visit the Robert Miller Gallery, and to see other museums and ga lleries was part of this program and generously supported by Joel Harnett, RC'45, and the University of Richmond. Ruth Sewing. 198:! Hercules. 1986
8 9 LYRIC REPRESENTATION: Paintings by Janet Fish
BY ROBERT C. MORGAN ln viewing Janet Fish's paintings, a feeling of the vernacular seems inescapable. These are carefully reasoned compositions, delicately woven interpreta tions of shape, color, and light, in which the most ordinary things receive careful scrutiny. Her paintings are considerably less anxious than the work of either the Surrealists or the Expressionists. Fish's work is subdued, assured, and harmonious. The references are always clear. Her paintings appear to focus upon those silent intervals between the everyday drone of mechanical sound and voices. Her painting, Geography (1984), is a celebration of her world view where we receive the same kind of heightened calm that one might associate with the Dutch painter Vermeer. This is scarcely a meta physical world where predetermined conflicts seek forceful resolution. It is instead a world with references to the world of travel and navigation as seen from the viewpoint of domesticity. As with Vermeer, Fish's painting gives us a convincing idea about the virtues of settling into a place, a common place of quiet ease and comfort, yet not at the expense of losing touch with the world-at-large. In Geography there is a counterpoise which is formally constructed between the globe on the upper right and a glass bowl of unpeeled fruit near the lower left of the table. Surrounding these two shapes are numerous travel-related objects. The interior scene of Geography is one filled with an aura of utter domesticity. It is an aura which finds perfect harmony with the activities of the world, with foreign places. This poised equilibrium between the inner and the outer, the domestic and the itinerant, pervades the overall composition of this and other paintings. The color is hardly if ever somber. The areas of focus, whether on tables or in backyards, are evenly modulated with a diffusion of light. Fish's paintings are not about contrasting lights Waiting fo r Will. 1986 and darks. Nor are they about imposed figure-to me nt of her subjects, particularly if her subjects are vi ual ecstacy is suggested within th domain of ground interactions. being asked to pose intermittently over the course ever yday events, an attitud e toward festivity and In Chinoiserie (1984), for example, the extreme of a few days. The directness of Fish's observation surprise, toward the richness of direct perception as horizontal emphasis given to the painterly format has always been an important and significant aspect an act of hedoni stic delight. As with Mary Cassatt, allows an assortment of objects gathered from a of her work. Because of this, her paintings retain a Ms. Fish's world is tilled with domestic signs and Chinese New Year's celebration in New York to certain rigo r and integrity, responsible to the facts gestures which are important and often ignored by evoke a flowing surface rhythm that would have gleaned through perception, and without the rigidity men. Her paintings maintain an au ra in the true made Matisse shudder with delight. of a painted image first seen through the camera 's sense of giving a special presence to those objects Light is pervasive in Fish's paintings as it was for lens. and event · which can be patiently observed and the early Impressionists. The sense of movement To conceive of paintings, such as Ruth Sewing translated into meaningful constru cts of reality. This between indoor and outdoor environments is (1983) , as images siphoned through the mechanical kind of observation and translation in volves a pecial poignantly captured in such paintings as Autumn "objectivity" of a camera seems unli kely. The sense kind of inte lligence, one that is too often downplayed (1985) and Waiting for Will (1986). Although of intimacy between the painter and her subj ects is in the context of cunent high-tech cu lture. different in mood and subject matter, these paintings always a primary issue. As a result, the subtlety Perhaps one can say of Janet Fish's paintings that carry an easy passage from one space to another. In that one finds in these painting is rather astonish they give light to those things which our high-tech each work, the transition of moving visually between ing. These are moments of quiet apprehension, a era may have neglected or dismissed too easily. In a one space and another is accentuated. Even when an slight pause in the activity, where a patt rn or a world of fab ricated objects and mediated electronic artificial lamp is painted, as in Waiting for Will, the thought is being reflected upon. In Ruth SewinJ?, it is imagery, it i indeed refreshing to take another look source of the light is somewhere else, thus avoiding almost as iI the activity of the female subj ect were a at the everyday world of how people reall y look and the dramatic seduction of chiaroscuro effects. The me tonym for the activity of the painter herself who how they interact with the objects they possess. In mood suggested in Waiting for Will, in which a is engaged with fitting the parts of the compositi on this sense, Ms. Fish frames these occasions in a young woman peers through a large glass window together through careful lookin g. new pictorial viewpoint, a human viewpoint, that is across a field of grass and down the path leading to For Ms. Fish, such careful looking is necessar y to telling us about those things in the world today the house, is represented in the most straight the actual representation of things which, in turn, those feelings-which ultimately give us the courage forward manner. A slight apprehension is expressed makes the painting function as more than a simple simply to be who we are. in the subtle tension of the woman's body positioned sign. Her work is not about notation or the detach t I 9M7 f< of)(·rt L MurJ.::
15 Lubell, Ellen. Review, Arts Magazine, May 1979, Battcock, Gregory. Super Realism, E.P. Dutton & SELECTED REVIEWS illustrated. Co., New York, 1975. Nemser, Cindy. "Conversation with Janet Fish," Contemporary American Realism Since 1960, Bass, Ruth. Review, Artnews, April 1980. FeministArtjournal, Fall 1976, Vol. 5, No. 3, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, 1981. Text Berlind, Robert. Review, Art in America, Marchi pp. 4-10. by Frank H. Goodyear, Jr., pp. 182-183, April 1979, illustrated. Nochlin, Linda. "Some Women Realists: Part I," illustrated. Cottingham, Jane. "Janet Fish: Perceptual Realist," Arts Magazine, February 1974, pp. 46-51. Eight Contemporary American Realists, Pennsylva AmericanArtist, October 1982, cover, pp. 44- Phillips, Deborah. Review, Art News, March 1981, nia Academy of Fine Arts, 1977. Text by Frank 49, 90, 94- 95. pp. 221, 228, illustrated. H. Goodyear, Jr., p. 38, illustrated. Ellensweig, Allen. "Janet Fish," Arts Magazine, Raynor, Vivien. "Art: Banquets of Glass Set Out Flower as Image in Contemporary Art, Wave Hill, October 1976, p. 111. by Janet Fish," New York Times, December 19, Bronx, N. Y., 1984. Gallati, Barbara. "Janet Fish/Robert Miller," Arts 1980. Janet Fish, Burton Skira & Co. Ltd., Publishers, Magazine, May 1983, Vol. 57, No. 9, p. 60. Raynor, Vivien. "Is Realism Really an Illusion? ," Switzerland, 1987. Text by Gerrit Henry. Gardner, Paul. "When Is a Painting Finished?," Art The New York Times, April 17, 1983, p. 24. Janet Fish, Robert Miller Gallery, New York City. News, November 1985, Vol. 84, No. 9, pp. 89- Russell, John. "Not So Much the Glasses as the 1980. Text by Barry Yourgrau, illustrated. 99. Light," The New York Times, February 22, Janet Fish, Robert Miller Gallery, 1985. Interview Genauer, Emily. "Art and the Artist," New York 1975, p. 23, illustrated. by Carter Ratcliff. Post, December 18, 1971, p. 36. Shorr, Harriet. Review, Art in America, Septem Late Twentieth Century Art, Sydney and Frances Goodman, Cynthia. "Eight Contemporary Ameri ber- October 1974, p. 109, illustrated. Lewis Foundation, Richmond, Va., 1981. Text can Realists," Arts Magazine, January 1978. Torregrossa, Bernice Collins. "It's the Real by Frederick R. Brandt and Susan L. Butler. Goodyear, Frank H. "American Realism Since Thing," Inbetween Magazine, Galveston, Texas, New Art, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York, 1960: Beyond the 'Perfect Green Pea'," Portfo February 1984. 1984. lio, November/December 1981, p. 72-81, New York Realists 1980, Thorpe Intermedia illustrated. Gallery, Sparkill, N. Y., 1980. Text by Roger Goodyear, Frank. "Contemporary Realism: The Howrigan, p. 24, illustrated. Challenge of Definition," American Art Review, Oreson, Janice. Still Life Today, The Board of November 1978, pp. 52-59, illustrated. SELECTED BOOKS AND Governors, Federal Reserve System, Washing Henry, Gerrit. "Janet Fish at Robert Miller," Art CATALOGUES ton, D.C., 1983. in America, Vol. 71, No. 5, May 1983, p. 167. Real, Really Real, Super Real, Directions in Henry, Gerril. "Janet Fish at Robert Miller," Art A Decade of American Realism: 1975-1985, Contemporary American Realism, San Antonio News, May 1985, Vol. 84, No. 5, pp. 117-118. Wichita Art Museum, Wichita, Kan., 1985. Museum Association, Texas, 1981. Essays by Henry, Gerrit. Review, Art News, May 1973. A Private Vision: ContemporaryArtfrom the Sally Boothe-Meredith, Alvin Martin and Philip Henry, Gerrit. "The Real Thing," Art Interna Graham Gund Collection, essays by Carl Belz, Pearlstein, p. 72, illustrated. tional, Summer 1972. Kathy Halbreich, Kenworth Moffett, Elizabeth Since 1980 New Narrative Painting. Phoenix Art Johnson, Patricia. "Fish's Still Lifes Complex Yet Sussman, and Didane W. Upright, Museum of Museum, Ariz., 1986. Organized by Metropoli Visually Accessible," Houston Chronicle, Fine Arts, Boston, 1982, p. 87, illustrated. tan Museum of Art, New York. November 9, 1985, p. 6, section 4. American Art Today: Still Life, Florida Interna The Artists' Choice Museum: the First Eight Years, Kramer, Hilton. "Realism: The Painting Is Fiction tional University, Miami, Fla., 1985. Artists' Choice Museum, New York, 1984. Enough," The New York Times, April 18, 1974. American Realism 1930s-1980s: A Comparative The Revival of Realism, Ralph Wilson Gallery, Kramer, Hilton. "Stealing the Modernist Fire," The Perspective, Surmnit Art Center, N.]., 1983. Lehigh University, Penn., 1979. Text by Lucille New York Times, December 26, 1971, p. 25, Text by Mary Wickliffe. Bunin Askin, p. 12, illustrated. illustrated. Arthur, John. Realists at Work, Watson-Guptill 20 Artists: Yale School ofArt, 1950-1970, Yale Kuspit, Donald B. "What's Real in Realism," Art in Publications, New York, 1983. University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn., America, September 1981, pp. 84-85. Aspects of '70s, Directions in Realism, Danforth 1981. Text by Irving Sandler, p. 36, illustrated. Lippard, Lucy. "Household Images in Art," Ms. Museum, Framingham, Mass., 1980. Text by Magazine, March 1973, pp. 22-25, illustrated. John Perrault, p. 13, illustrated.
16 GALLERY STAFF 'u anne Arnold , Director Lorraine Brevig, Gallery Assistant Kevin Ball, Intern
PHOTOGRAPHY CREDITS l Editor: Susanne Arnold Designer: Geary & Flynn Design, Inc./ David Kohan Typography: Coghill Composition Co. Printe r: Whittet & Shepperson MARSH GALLERY Modlin Fine Arts Center University of Richmond, Virginia 23173 804/289-8276