| YOUR SPACE HERE. click for advertising info |
| Copyright 2006 Art History Chicks LLC Contact Us |
susceptible to images
 |  |  |  |  |  |  |
| | | | | | |
With his academic qualifications secured, travel and teaching became Colt’s next pursuits. He
joined the faculty of the newly created UW-Milwaukee in 1957 and became a full professor by 1968.
After numerous awards and countless exhibitions, he retired in 1990 as professor emeritus. Even
then his creative impulses remained undiminished and Colt continued to make art until his death
in 1999 in Massachusetts where he had moved with his wife Ruth Kjaer after retirement.
“Nature Up Close: The Work of John Colt,” now at the Union Gallery is a wonderful tribute to this
artist’s affinity and obsession with nature. From childhood Colt was acutely aware of nature and
his surroundings and noted them diligently. As a teacher, he brought this interest into the
classroom as well as in his efforts to bring art to the homebound and disabled. Immersing himself
in his natural surroundings, his wife recalls the time an emerald damselfly landed on his
shirtsleeve in Door County and the time a long green garden snake appeared on his door mat
in Haiti. She felt that these creatures presented themselves to Colt because they knew he would
give them immortality through art. Indeed, this could be the essence of John Colt’s artistic legacy:
giving the smallest of creatures with the shortest of life spans immortality.
Images in the exhibition testify to this. Painted and drawn shapes appear in abstract form - often
tantalizingly non-committal - but with enough substance to suggest real objects capable of
movement, transformation and evolution. Indeed, evolution is a strong undercurrent to Colt’s work,
reflecting the artist's belief that nothing remains static, that all things change. “Today, most
scientists agree with the ancient Hindus that nothing exists or is destroyed,” Colt wrote. “Things
merely change shape or form.”
In addition to the paintings and prints which dominate the show there are also a few diaries and
sketchbooks revealing the artist’s intimate thoughts on his work and subject matter. “The world
thus appears to be a complicated tissue of events in which connections of different kinds alternate
or overlap or combine and thereby determine the texture of the whole,” he writes. “All phenomena
are processes, connections, all is in flux, and at moments like this flux is actually visible; one has
only to open the mind to see that there is no real edge to anything.”
Such appreciation of the evolutionary elements of nature would have found a parallel in the
transformation of the art world throughout Colt’s career. From the realism that dominated the art
world during his youth, through the abstract expressionists that dominated his post WWII
life to the post-modernism of his later career, evolution was a constant artistic companion. After all,
art is organic and develops from what has gone before, maintaining links to the past in form and
material.
joined the faculty of the newly created UW-Milwaukee in 1957 and became a full professor by 1968.
After numerous awards and countless exhibitions, he retired in 1990 as professor emeritus. Even
then his creative impulses remained undiminished and Colt continued to make art until his death
in 1999 in Massachusetts where he had moved with his wife Ruth Kjaer after retirement.
“Nature Up Close: The Work of John Colt,” now at the Union Gallery is a wonderful tribute to this
artist’s affinity and obsession with nature. From childhood Colt was acutely aware of nature and
his surroundings and noted them diligently. As a teacher, he brought this interest into the
classroom as well as in his efforts to bring art to the homebound and disabled. Immersing himself
in his natural surroundings, his wife recalls the time an emerald damselfly landed on his
shirtsleeve in Door County and the time a long green garden snake appeared on his door mat
in Haiti. She felt that these creatures presented themselves to Colt because they knew he would
give them immortality through art. Indeed, this could be the essence of John Colt’s artistic legacy:
giving the smallest of creatures with the shortest of life spans immortality.
Images in the exhibition testify to this. Painted and drawn shapes appear in abstract form - often
tantalizingly non-committal - but with enough substance to suggest real objects capable of
movement, transformation and evolution. Indeed, evolution is a strong undercurrent to Colt’s work,
reflecting the artist's belief that nothing remains static, that all things change. “Today, most
scientists agree with the ancient Hindus that nothing exists or is destroyed,” Colt wrote. “Things
merely change shape or form.”
In addition to the paintings and prints which dominate the show there are also a few diaries and
sketchbooks revealing the artist’s intimate thoughts on his work and subject matter. “The world
thus appears to be a complicated tissue of events in which connections of different kinds alternate
or overlap or combine and thereby determine the texture of the whole,” he writes. “All phenomena
are processes, connections, all is in flux, and at moments like this flux is actually visible; one has
only to open the mind to see that there is no real edge to anything.”
Such appreciation of the evolutionary elements of nature would have found a parallel in the
transformation of the art world throughout Colt’s career. From the realism that dominated the art
world during his youth, through the abstract expressionists that dominated his post WWII
life to the post-modernism of his later career, evolution was a constant artistic companion. After all,
art is organic and develops from what has gone before, maintaining links to the past in form and
material.
Nature Up Close:
The Work of John Colt
Union Gallery
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Through October 12, 2006
A strong case can be made that John Colt was
born to be an artist and a teacher. His parents,
Arthur and Mary, ran the Colt School of Art in
Madison. Growing up amidst this artistic milieu, the
young John created art until he enlisted in the US
Navy in 1943 at the age of eighteen. His practical
experience was rather opposite of his intended
career path: he served his country as an electrician
in a submarine in the South Pacific. In 1946, after
his service, he earned a degree in art education
and a master’s degree in art from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison.
The Work of John Colt
Union Gallery
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Through October 12, 2006
A strong case can be made that John Colt was
born to be an artist and a teacher. His parents,
Arthur and Mary, ran the Colt School of Art in
Madison. Growing up amidst this artistic milieu, the
young John created art until he enlisted in the US
Navy in 1943 at the age of eighteen. His practical
experience was rather opposite of his intended
career path: he served his country as an electrician
in a submarine in the South Pacific. In 1946, after
his service, he earned a degree in art education
and a master’s degree in art from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison.
Installation view.
Several works in the exhibition are large, raising
the size of the small elements Colt renders to
enormous proportions. Field Day (1981)
exemplifies this. Its size (82”x 54”) has
suggestions of myriad tiny creatures and natural
elements such as centipedes, butterflies, snails,
grasses, wind-blown stalks, bugs and sea
anemones. Here is nature writ large and the
effect is stunning. The size, color and lack of
clinical detail give the painting a sense of the
monumental and reinforces the artist’s belief in
the value and integrity of a natural work that is so
often discounted. As Bruce Pepich, Director of
the Racine Art Museum, presciently notes in a
Continuum catalog essay about the exhibition,
the artist discovered “a macro universe in a
micro-world.” Certainly the artist was keenly
attuned to the micro and macro of nature, the
millions of components that comprise the
natural world – the constant seasonal cycle of
birth/death/regeneration – and an awareness
that no two days, indeed no two minutes are
exactly the same. There is also a great sense of
movement, albeit frozen, in his work, as if one of
those Disney nature documentaries with time-
lapse photography was momentarily frozen,
before being released and the cacophony of
miniscule sound and movement resumes. Black
the size of the small elements Colt renders to
enormous proportions. Field Day (1981)
exemplifies this. Its size (82”x 54”) has
suggestions of myriad tiny creatures and natural
elements such as centipedes, butterflies, snails,
grasses, wind-blown stalks, bugs and sea
anemones. Here is nature writ large and the
effect is stunning. The size, color and lack of
clinical detail give the painting a sense of the
monumental and reinforces the artist’s belief in
the value and integrity of a natural work that is so
often discounted. As Bruce Pepich, Director of
the Racine Art Museum, presciently notes in a
Continuum catalog essay about the exhibition,
the artist discovered “a macro universe in a
micro-world.” Certainly the artist was keenly
attuned to the micro and macro of nature, the
millions of components that comprise the
natural world – the constant seasonal cycle of
birth/death/regeneration – and an awareness
that no two days, indeed no two minutes are
exactly the same. There is also a great sense of
movement, albeit frozen, in his work, as if one of
those Disney nature documentaries with time-
lapse photography was momentarily frozen,
before being released and the cacophony of
miniscule sound and movement resumes. Black
Fan and Night Game (both from 1980) exemplify this with a blurred sense of movement delineated
by indistinct forms and energetic draughtsmanship. This gives the impression of a strong breeze
creating chaos amidst nature, spreading blossoms and pollen and creating new life elsewhere.
As Colt aged his touch became lighter, less distinct, and more dream-like in quality. His paintings
from the 1950s and ‘60s are almost aggressive in their colors and brushwork, something notably
absent in his later work where softer colors and edges prevail. These later works reflect a sense of
the artist being confident and knowledgeable enough in his subjects to economize in gesture and
color. Even so, no matter which works are being considered, there is a striking dissonance
between the works themselves and the gallery space. While the drawings and paintings have
elements of reverence, suggestiveness and the ethereal, the brutal concrete forms of the gallery
space tend to dwarf both the work and the viewer. These are works that would be ideally viewed a
more intimate space. This juxtaposition of the art and space brings to mind the issue of nature
versus man and one instinctively knows that Colt’s work and the nature cycle that so attracted and
captivated him will endure far beyond the lifespan of the Union building.
So what is the lesson in John Colt’s work, if there is one? It is quite simply to be aware that in our
lives - with all their complexities and traumas - there exists all around us a world unseen, ignored
or unacknowledged where life spans may be shorter but are no less real and full of unseen,
unacknowledged acts of creation and regeneration. It is a positive message manifested through
art but applicable in our everyday lives: we must endeavor to renew ourselves both physically and
spiritually, learning from the past and applying those lessons to the future. It’s called evolution and
to deny its reality and necessity is to consign oneself to extinction.
-Graeme Reid
Graeme Reid is the assistant director of the West Bend Art Museum.
Comments? Email comments@susceptibletoimages.com
by indistinct forms and energetic draughtsmanship. This gives the impression of a strong breeze
creating chaos amidst nature, spreading blossoms and pollen and creating new life elsewhere.
As Colt aged his touch became lighter, less distinct, and more dream-like in quality. His paintings
from the 1950s and ‘60s are almost aggressive in their colors and brushwork, something notably
absent in his later work where softer colors and edges prevail. These later works reflect a sense of
the artist being confident and knowledgeable enough in his subjects to economize in gesture and
color. Even so, no matter which works are being considered, there is a striking dissonance
between the works themselves and the gallery space. While the drawings and paintings have
elements of reverence, suggestiveness and the ethereal, the brutal concrete forms of the gallery
space tend to dwarf both the work and the viewer. These are works that would be ideally viewed a
more intimate space. This juxtaposition of the art and space brings to mind the issue of nature
versus man and one instinctively knows that Colt’s work and the nature cycle that so attracted and
captivated him will endure far beyond the lifespan of the Union building.
So what is the lesson in John Colt’s work, if there is one? It is quite simply to be aware that in our
lives - with all their complexities and traumas - there exists all around us a world unseen, ignored
or unacknowledged where life spans may be shorter but are no less real and full of unseen,
unacknowledged acts of creation and regeneration. It is a positive message manifested through
art but applicable in our everyday lives: we must endeavor to renew ourselves both physically and
spiritually, learning from the past and applying those lessons to the future. It’s called evolution and
to deny its reality and necessity is to consign oneself to extinction.
-Graeme Reid
Graeme Reid is the assistant director of the West Bend Art Museum.
Comments? Email comments@susceptibletoimages.com
| John Colt, Field Day, 1981. Wright Museum of Art, Beloit College. |