JOAN MITCHELL, her quotes on painting art and artist life in American Abstract Expressionism, later in France + biography
Joan Mitchell (1926 – 1992), her quotes on painting art by the American / French woman artist who worked and lived as young painter in American Abstract Expressionism in New York. Later Joan Mitchell moved – after a few temporary stays – definitely to France in the 1950’s. Mitchell was as artist strongly attracted by the art of the French painter Claude Monet. At the bottom more biography facts and some useful art links for the woman artist Joan Mitchell – the editor.
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Joan Mitchell in her studio, c. 1956 |
Joan Mitchell, artist quotes of the American woman painter on her painting and life in Abstract Expressionism
– I’ve have tried to take from everybody… …I can’t close my eyes or limit my experiences… …Because I live now, I am more interested in art now. It’s different as any art is different from period to period. But it’s no better or worse.
* Joan Mitchell, quote from: ‘Art News’, September 1958, p. 41; as quoted in ”The New York school – the painters & sculptors of the fifties”, Irving Sandler, Harper & Row, Publishers, 1978, p. 69 (American French woman artist; Abstract-Expressionism / New York School; more biography & life facts at the bottom)
– When I came back (from Paris, fh) and heard you play with Charles Mingus (free jazz musician, bass, fh), and when you and Cecil Taylor (free Jazz pianist, fh) opened up the ‘Five Spot’ in the fall of 1956, I felt better about being in New York. All the musicians who create from the gut as well as their intellect can change things. People will never understand what we are doing if they can’t feel. All art is abstract. All music is abstract. But it’s all real… …we were all trying to bring that spirit, that spontaneous energy, into our work. (reacting to jazz-player David Anram in the jazz club the ‘Five Spot’, 1957, she was visiting with artist painter Franz Kline, fh).
* her quote on jazz music and her painting, in: ‘Introduction’, David Anram, in ”The Stamp of Impulse, Abstract expressionist prints”, David Acton, p. 21.
– It’s (the color white, fh) death. It’s hospitals. It’s my terrible nurses. You can add in Melville, ‘Moby Dick’ a chapter on white. White is absolute horror. It is just the worst. (around 1956.
* Joan Mitchell, quote on the color white: ”Abstract Expressionism”, Barbara Hess, Taschen, Köln, 2006, p. 78.
– I’m trying to remember what I felt about a certain Cyprus tree.
* Joan Mitchell on her way of painting: ‘Art News’, April 1965, p. 63; as quoted in ”The New York school – the painters & sculptors of the fifties”, Irving Sandler, Harper & Row, Publishers, 1978, p. 69.
– Pop Art, Op Art, Flop Art and Slop Art… …I fall into the last two categories (remark, mid 1970’s) .
* her quotes on the impact of Pop Art and its popularity: ”Abstract Expressionism”, Barbara Hess, Taschen, Köln, 2006, p. 78.
– When I was sick they moved me to a room with a window and suddenly through the window I saw two fir trees in a park, and the grey sky, and the beautiful grey rain, and I was so happy. It has something to do with being alive. I could see the pine trees, and I felt I could paint. If I could see them, I felt I would paint a painting. Last year (1985, fh) I could not paint. For a while I did not react to anything. All I saw was a white metallic color.
* Joan Mitchell on her painting activity, from ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, p. 31.
– Sunflowers are something I feel very intensively. They look so wonderful when young and they are so moving when are dying. I don’t like fields of sunflowers. I like them alone or, of course, painted by Van Gogh.
* her quote on how she experiences sunflowers: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– Feeling is something more; it’s feeling your existence. It’s not just survival. Painting is a means of feeling ”living”… .Painting is the only art form except still photography which is without time. Music takes time to listen to and ends, writing takes time and ends, movies ends, ideas and even sculpture take time. Painting does not. It never ends, it is the only thing that is both continuous and still, Then I can be very happy. It’s a still place. It’s like one word, one image.
* Joan Mitchell on feeling: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– I am trying to achieve anything I can (in painting, fh). I don’t set out to achieve a specific thing, perhaps to catch motion or to catch a feeling. Call it layer painting, gestural painting, easel painting or whatever you want. I paint oil on canvas – without an easel. Conventional methods. I do not condense things. I try to eliminate clichés, extraneous material. I try to make it exact. My painting is not an allegory or a story. It is more like a poem.
* Joan Mitchell, on het way of painting: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– It seems very clear what it (the painting, fh) means. I can’t say it, but the painting makes it clear. If I don’t know, then it’s not working. If it seems right to me, then it has a meaning, but I can’t tell you what meaning. I can’t be more specific than that. It works when it means something, when I don’t question it any more.
* her quote on abstract painting and the way it speaks,: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– I think any involvement of any kind is to forget not being alive. Painting is one of those things. I am alive, we are alive, we are not aware of what is coming next. I am afraid of death. Abandonment is death also. I mean: somebody leaves and other people also leave. I never say goodbye to people….
* Joan Mitchell on painting, life and death: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– Sometimes I don’t know what to do with it (the painting, fh). Sometimes I don’t know exactly what I want. I cheque it out, recheque it for days or weeks. Sometimes there is more to do on it. Sometimes I am afraid of ruining what I have. Sometimes I am lazy, I don’t finish it or I don’t push it far enough. Sometimes I think it’s a painting.
* quote on her way of abstract painting: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– I don’t always connect the painting with me, with that person I hear on the tape, although the ideas are familiar. I imagine a sort of scaffolding made of painting stretchers around a lot of colored chaos as an identity. I am an outsider, I happen to live in France (Joan Mitchell was first an American Abstract Expressionist woman artist in New York, fh), I am an alien. So for my identity I need to know where I am, to look at maps. I want to know where the north is, and Vétheuil, and New York, and what street I am on.
* her quote on being an outsider in France as American artist ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– I have often questioned, ”Did I do that?” on seeing a painting of mine unexpectedly in some place. It has become disconnected. Once they leave the studio, they go and it is another sort of abandonment… …But a painting is not part of me. Because when I do paint, I am not aware of myself. As I said before, I am ”no hands,” the painting is telling me what to do. So it is not really a part of me at all. It is part of something else.
* Joan Mitchell on how being aware and the state of mind during the creation: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– I want to paint the feeling of a space. It might be an enclosed space, it might be a vast space. It might be an object working with (Hans) Hans Hofmann‘s (American abstract expressionist painter and famous art teacher in the first generation, fh) phrase ”push and pull,” the structure, the light, the space, the color.
* Joan Mitchell, quote on space: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– Abstract is not a style. I simply want to make a surface work. This is just a use of space and form: it’s an ambivalence of forms and space.
* her quote on abstract painting art: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
– When I was young… …all I wanted to do was paint. I was so and still I am in such adulation of great painters. If you study a Matisse, the way paint is put on and the way he puts on white, that’s painting technique. I wanted to put on paint like Matisse. I worked hard at that a very long time ago. Someone said to me recently with surprise ”But you don’t paint in ‘series,’ you paint pictures, each painting is different.” And I thought No, I paint paintings.
* Joan Mitchell, quote on the impact of Matisse on her art: ‘Conversations with Joan Mitchell’, Yves Michaud, 1986; as quoted in ‘Joan Mitchell: New Paintings’, ed. Xavier Fourcade, New York 1986, n.p.
short biography facts of the American woman artist Joan Mitchell in Abstract-expressionism
Joan Mitchell worked and lived as young woman artist most of the time in American Abstract Expressionism in New York; later she moved definitely to France in the 1950’s. She was strongly attracted by the art of the French painter Monet!
Mitchell was already early learning the modern European art, she moved to New York in 1949 and got a travel grant she used visiting Europe till 1951. Back in the States she was one of the woman artists in the New York Eight Street Club. She belongs to the second generation – with Helen Frankenthaler – of Abstract Expressionism, where the elder woman artist Lee Krasner belonged to the first generation. In the late 1950’s her work became increasingly accepted and appreciated. Joan Mitchell didn’t seek to demarcate her art from the European art as many American painters did, and clearly there is a common lyrical atmosphere in her paintings. Between 1955 – 1959 she lived both in the States and France and then decided to settle in France definitely. In 1959 she took part in Documenta 2 in Kassel.
art links for more information on the American woman artist Joan Mitchell, + biography
* biography of Joan Mitchell, American woman artist in Abstract Expressionism, on Wikipedia
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