#painter

[newyorkthegoldenage]

Palmer Hayden, The Janitor Who Paints, ca. 1930, repainted after 1940, oil on canvas.

Palmer Hayden was known for his paintings of the African-American scene. In a 1969 interview he described The Janitor Who Paints, created around 1930, as "a sort of protest painting" of his own economic and social standing as well as that of his fellow African-Americans.

The most immediate source for the element of protest that Hayden associated with the work, however, was his friendship with Cloyd Boykin, an older African-American painter who supported himself as a janitor: "I painted it because no one called Boykin the artist. They called him the janitor." Hayden incorporated details such as the beret and the subject of mother and child to reinforce the sense of artistic identity, while the clock alludes to the workman's schedule. (Smithsonian American Art Museum)

Details within the cramped apartment—the duster and the trashcan, for example—point to the janitor's profession; the figure's dapper clothes and beret, much like those Hayden himself wore, point to his artistic pursuits. Hayden's use of perspective was informed by modern art practices, which favored abstraction and simplified forms. He originally exaggerated the figure's facial features, which many of his contemporaries criticized as African-American caricatures, but later altered the painting. He maintained the janitor as the protagonist as it represented larger civil rights issues within the African-American community. (John Ott, "Labored Stereotypes: Palmer Hayden's 'The Janitor Who Paints,'" American Art 22, no.1, Spring 2008).

Photo: Smithsonian American Art Museum

[greekmythcomix]

Inspired by the recent excavations and new frescos at Pompeii

Our friend Papilio the Painter from ‘Amarantus and his Neighbours’ (Caroline Lawrence and CSCP) for Dr Sophie Hay

With apologies to the painters of Pompeii

PHOTO BBC/TONYJOLIFFE

[praline1968]

Ekaterina Neshkova

[aloesthetic]

Apple Blossoms by Charles Caryl Coleman (1889)

At the Metropolitan Museum of Art

February 18th, 2018

[annasellheim]

next part

[gardenbicycle]

"Insomnia" (1947) Remedios Varo

[mcpirita]

Works by Ozy Worldy 

[kness]

Another animal portrait, a sea otter 🦦

Prints

[ancientsstudies]

brfantasme.

[bizarreauhavre]

Philippe Rousseau, 1816-1887 - The rat who withdrew from the world

[make-death-proud-to-takeus]

The morning after the festival by Ludwig Knaus

[monogreek]

Getting Ready by George Thomas Georgiadis (1933-2010)

[arinewman7]

The Fruit Carrier

Inji Efflatoun

[jetleparti]

Prometheus / Pandora (center) & Scapegoat. (left) in studio. end of 2023. via Jet Le Parti archive.

[chromet]

Custom Nike AF-1 by Bandulu

[mon-petit-coeur-noir]