California Art and Artist Robert Arneson - Essay Example

California art and artist (Robert Arneson) Introduction Robert Arneson was a born and raised California artist, who was mainly interested in the popularization of non-functional ceramic art as an important element in the fine arts. He is regarded as one of the major founders of the Funk Movement as an art form especially in the San Francisco Bay area. Artist profile Robert Carston Arneson; born September 4, 1930 – November 2, 1992 in Benica, California, was an American sculptor and also a professor of ceramics in the art department at University of California, Davis for a period of four decades . Arneson graduated from Benicia high school and also spent some of his early life as a cartoonist for a local newspaper. After high school, he went on to study at California College of the arts in Oakland, California and went on to receive an MFA in 1958. During the 1960s, Arneson and several other California artists started a new artistic style which was dubbed funk art which became a movement which they dubbed the Funk movement. He is also considered to be the father of the funk movement which was basically the use of everyday objects to make confrontational statements. He used these common objects in both of his works which included drawings and ceramic sculptures. During this time also, Arneson was a teacher by profession and was teaching at Santa Rosa junior college in Santa Rosa California (1958-1959), where he began teaching immediately he received his MFA degree from California College of Arts. This was immediately followed by a position at Fremont High School(1959-1960) in Oakland, California, before he was appointed to teach crafts and design at mills college also located in Oakland California from (1960-1962). From the period of 1962 onwards, Arneson was appointed at the University of California Davis, together with other various artists by Richard L. Nelson who had recognized his various works and had also just founded the art department at the University. At the university, Arneson founded the ceramics sculpture programme for the department, which was considered a rather radical move since ceramics were not yet considered a medium of fine arts. Since then, Arneson remained put at the university for close to three decades, where his ceramic studio had been, until his retirement in 1991 when it was reported that that he had been ill for some time. He died on November 2, 1992, after a long battle with cancer. Artistic work Funk art as an artistic movement was founded by Robert Arneson majorly as a reaction against the nonobjectivity of abstract expressionism. This art form was regarded as funky, sensuous and quirky. The funk art movement can also be considered as a regional movement since it was mostly confined within Northern California which was the residential area for Arneson. Funk art helped artists such as Robert Arneson to identify with themselves on a personal level instead of focusing on the social causes and questioning the ways of the world. Funk artistry helped artists do their work with a sense of humor, vulgar sexuality with a tinge of autobiographical references in that, most of the sculptures he made like the eggheads; mostly found at the entrance of the university of California, bear a self-resemblance to him and can also be evidenced by how Arneson made various ceramic sculptures of himself such as the “hollow gesture” and “California artist”. Though the works are humorous, they are at times ironical and cover a more serious undertone. Funk art is also considered ambiguous due to the fact that they have no clear meaning. Arneson made his ceramics using clay, which he used to mould the sculptures and ceramics with, though other funk artists’ preferred assemblage; which consisted of thrown out garbage and demonstrated that funk as an art medium was not part of consumer culture. Arneson also made use of soda bottles, typewriters toilets and other readily available objects in the creation of his artistry. In the summer of 1963 when Robert Arneson received an invitation to exhibit his works in Oakland at the Kaiser center which was dubbed the “California sculpture”, Arneson made a ceramic sculpture of a toilet. He attributed the toilet feature with sexual anatomy such as, to the flush handle, the opening of the bowl, the seat and even installed a pile of ceramic excrement which spelled ‘ART’ inside the bowl. The ceramic which was named John with art, 1964, was widely criticized and was confused with Duchamp’s fountain. Arnesons toilet exhibit was removed from Kaiser Center which was an encouragement to him in that, he realized that he had finally made a piece of work that was unique to itself. If the work of art was vulgar, he was vulgar. After Robert Arneson, ceramics started to be accepted and appreciated as a serious art form both nationally and internationally which was a change from a mere form of craft (DeFeo pg 86). Many of Arnesons work included personal elements of his sculptures which formed the defining factor of funk art. Robert Arnesons works were playful and full of color and were of mundane, everyday objects. He created a media through which artist could express their personalities without barriers of moral structures since artists from other movements considered funk as inappropriate, vulgar humor as well as containing sexual referencing. Other funk works used funny and absurd styles and imagery to convey messages to people so that they should not take art or themselves too seriously. The ceramics made by funk artists such as Robert Arneson possessed the ideals of functionless sculptures for sculptures sake. He was so much at ease with his works that when he was commissioned to make a commemorative sculpture of the San Francisco mayor who had been assassinated, he made a bloody sculpture that caused uproar in the city that was still grieving the loss of its popular politician. This is to say that, his art could not be conveyed in words but was to be appreciated by the eyes. Funk art had to be seen to be appreciated in that, one had to see the work of art to get the humor, sexual vulgar or absurdity to get what the art stands for or represents. Example of such a work is the colonel is at it again. . California art California is known for and has been known world over for its prosperity in the arts and more specifically in the entertainment; encompassing motion pictures, television and music and is also home to Hollywood which is a district in Los Angeles and is associated with the movie industry. Before Robert Arneson and his funk movement, art in California were basically borrowed in that, most people appreciated Dadaism and surrealism as art forms which were cultural movements that had began in the early 1920s. The two art movement were majorly philosophical in nature in that, Dadaism was anti war and also anti-bourgeois and was radical in nature. Surrealism on the other hand contained elements of surprise and juxtaposition, and artists and writers of this movement regarded their work as expressions of philosophical movements (Arneson et al, pg189). The introduction of the funk movement especially in California, took some time to be accepted since critics were used to abstract artistry that had hidden meanings, unlike funk art which was less serious and humorous and had a lighter touch to life in general. Wally Bill Hedrick an artist and a resident of California also helped in the development of funk art by creation of mechanical kinetic sculpture and further developed his funk art to create his own art form labeled “conceptual art “due to his known image of an “idea artist”. His wife Jay Defeo who created the rose, which somewhat illustrated her transformation process and weighed 2,300 pounds which also paved way for appreciation of art in any form or weight. Assemblage as a form of art creation had helped in the creation of the funk movement by artists such as Bruce Conner who had started to make use of the art form together with film, drawing and collage. His settlement in California later in his life helped in the development of the funk movement since his form of work was widely appreciated, though they lacked precise meanings (Conner, pg123). Wallace Berman specialized in assemblage and sculpturing from wood though he created “verifax collages” which consisted of images from magazines and newspapers mounted on a flat surface (Berman, pg158). This provided a plat form for Robert Arneson for his funk movement to create using any available material due to his embrace of collage. Funk as a form of art revolutionalised art in general since it focuses on the appreciation of the little things in life and the identification of things in life that can make us smile. Bibliography Arneson, Robert, Gary Garrels, Janet C. Bishop, and Jonathan D. Fineberg. Robert Arneson: Self-reflections. San Francisco, Calif: San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 1997. Print. Berman, Wallace. Wallace Berman retrospective: an exhibition. Los Angeles: The Fellows, 1978. Print. Conner, Bruce. 2000 BC: the Bruce Conner story part II.. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 1999. Print. DeFeo, Jay, Carter Ratcliff, and Halley K. Harrisburg. Jay DeFeo: ingredients of alchemy, before and after the rose : March 14-May 4, 2002. New York: Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, 2002. Print. Read More