Famous Artist #19

John Baldessari

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Born 1931 and Died 2020 (88 years old

American conceptual known for his dotted faces.He has also done printmaking, film, installation, sculpture, photography, painting.

He went and also taught art at San Diego State College.He taught at a variety of places for 30+ years. He became the head of the art program at UCSD in 1968. In 1970 he moved to Santa Monica where he was a teacher at CalArts where he met many artists.

1966 he was using photos and text on canvas. His early work was empty canvases derived from contemporary art theory statements.

One of his most famous works is in 1970 he decided to cremate his early work (1953-1966) some of the ashes from the paintings were put in cookies and an urn in the shape of a book.

He would also take mostly film stills out of context by adding text with the images. He would also take photography books from amateurs and use them as well. He would also use photos of him self in his work. Another one of the juxtaposing works would be like a glass and he would put “a glass is a glass”.

He would use him self in a lot of his work. He had a interest in language.

The dots on faces came from those adhesive stickers and putting them on faces. This series of work came to be in the mid80’s and on.

Famous Photographer #24

Gregory Crewdson

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Born 1962 ( 57years old

His photography is called tableaux. It looks like a movie still, he sets up everything for his photographs.

When he was younger he was in a band called The Speedies and one of the songs were  "Let Me Take Your Photo”.

His time at Purchase College is where he experimented with photography but only as an outlet and hobby. After his time there he went to Yale to get his MFA. His senior thesis was about portraits of people who lived in Lee MA.

He has taught classes at a few colleges but he is now a professor at Yale.

Most of his photos are surreal, some of his inspirations are Vertigo and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. He is also a fan of Edward hopper.

Famous Artist #18

Jack Tworkov

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1900-1982

American abstract expressionist painter

He was not interested in art at all during school. He went to Columbia to become a writer. He kept going with writing till his sister told him to go to Art student League of NY. He also went to National Academy of Design NY.

Him and 2 other creatives spent time in the Catskills.

During the Great Depression he worked for the Federal Art Project Division of the Work Projects Administration where he met De Kooning and learned more about Abstract Expressionism.

Him, De Kooning, Rothko, Pollock and Arshile Gorky founded the NYS.

During his life he became a teacher at a few places such as Pratt, Black Mountain, Yale.

Famous Photographer #23

Joel Meyerowitz

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Born 1938 (81 years old

He is mostly known for his street photography but has also done portrait as well as landscape work. He was also one of the early adaptors of color during the time when it was still looked down on.

He has work is many public and private collections, such as the MOMA, NY Library, he also has many awards as well for his photography work.

In the early 60’s he quite his job working at an agency as an art director to become a photographer after seeing Robert Frank.

During the 70’s is when he began to use color film more than BW. He also used large format camera to photograph portraits.

He went to school at Ohio state and studied art.

Famous Photographer #22

Neil Leifer

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Born 1942 (77 years old

He is a photographer and film maker. He is mostly known for some of the most famous sports photos like the first one on the side.

His first photography experience was with the Henry Street Settlement House. They offer classes for the lower class.  John Iacono, Manny Millan, and Stanley Kubrick are also some big names to come out of the classes.

He was an average American boy working odd jobs till he could buy his first camera.

When he first started taking sports photos, they were at Giant’s games, he got to go in for free in exchange for helping handicap guests. He got to go on the field with the other photographers.

He went to the “Greatest Game Ever Played.” which was between the  Baltimore Colts VS giants game. He sold some photos of the game to SI (sports illustrated).

He got his first cover photo at SI when he was just 19 years old and they loved working with him.

Neil was also known to be a risk taker with his camera, putting the camera in places where he and or the camera could have caused an accident or gotten him self hurt.

Besides working for SI, he also worked with TIME.