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FEATURE
Anton Weiss Freedom of Expression by Katie Sulkowski | Photos by Anthony Scarlati
the most definitive movement in American art captured the global imagination. Abstract Expressionism dramatically transformed visual culture as the world had known it. Figures like Jackson Pollock and Clement Greenberg championed Abstract Expressionism as the culmination of all art history to date. Artists and critics, fueled by American political and economic prominence, used Abstract Expressionism to relocate the art capital of the world from Paris to New York City. Waves of Eastern European painters departed for the United States and brought with them the cultural richness and classical training that they had received in their homelands. In the years directly following World War II,
Forced into a Russian concentration camp in Yugoslavia, Weiss and his mother both courageously escaped. Weiss was 10 when he entered and 13 when he escaped six months after his mother. This turning point in his formative years allowed the artist to take part in an activity that has characterized his career and painting process to this date: the quest for freedom has played like a leitmotif throughout the artist’s personal and professional life. In Weiss’ opinion, his experiences in the prison of a concentration camp fuel a greater freedom of expression in his paintings today. He says, “I don’t feel bad about what happened to me. I reveal or address those experiences to make me a better individual, and I will perform in a much deeper sense than if I block them out. There’s no such thing as a bad experience if you use that experience as a positive gesture for the future. I think that you survive by that, and eventually it makes you a broader individual.”
Anyone who appreciates modern art knows that the year 1945 is the watershed moment for this style. Postwar America bebopped in local dance halls, drove fast cars, and lined up at drive-in movies. The pride of victory in war and economic flourishing permeated American culture. European artists made the journey from war-torn, occupied Paris to the bustling streets of New York City. In this environment, Abstract Expressionism exploded in popular culture. This painting style forever changed the course of modern art. One can trace the same geographical and stylistic motifs in the career of Nashville artist Anton Weiss. Weiss, who is Austrian, arrived on American shores from behind the walls of a Russian concentration camp. His brother and grandfather dead, his father forced into years of conscription with Hitler’s army, Weiss’ life was shattered and broken. For him, the colorful sidewalks of New York City and the freedom of Abstract Expressionism determined the arc of his life as an artist. Weiss spent his boyhood summers at his mother’s family’s winery in Yugoslavia. The country was invaded by the Nazis at the outset of World War II. Before the war, Weiss’ childhood had been quiet and peaceful. His parents were both painters, and his early memories are dotted with recollections of their work. When Hitler’s army exited Weiss’ ravaged homeland, the echoing footfall of soldiers’ boots fell on a life altered and damaged for the teenage artist.
During the war, Weiss had watched a documentary on the stormy life of the artist Michelangelo with his father while the latter was on leave from war. The film made a vivid impression on the young boy. He knew as he left the theatre that his true passion and
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Weiss’ desire for artistic identity would be found in art. After leaving the concentration camp, Weiss enrolled in an apprenticeship in which he restored damaged frescoes in venerable Austrian cathedrals. Already, art was helping him to repair the damage of war and captivity. Internally, he continues the process to this date. Weiss directly confronts his memories and experiences from the past to inform his painting technique: “A revolt is stimulated within me and I will probably exercise a much stronger action to that revolt than if I were to paint all pretty things . . .It depends on the individual how they want to approach life. I find myself digging into the past to be stimulated by a positive reaction to that.”
freedom demanded
that he find a mode of
painting and expression that he could own.
In the aftermath of the war, Weiss and his mother were reunited with his father by the Red Cross. A Catholic charity helped bring them to the United States. The family by which they were sponsored lived in Middle Tennessee. After a couple of moves to different towns in the area, Weiss settled in Nashville. Neither the city nor the artist has ever been the same. Weiss attended Watkins Institute, the forerunner of Watkins College of Art and Design. Studying at Watkins gave Weiss the opportunity to continue pursuit of the great traditions of Western art. In his adulthood, the artist returned to Watkins as a professor and later became head of the art department. In 1956, Weiss began a four-year sojourn in New York City. This visit allowed the painter to experience the Big Apple in the full bloom of post-war American painting. The city was buzzing with new artists, immigrants, jazz music. Weiss enrolled in the legendary Art Students League in New York. Originally hopeful about his involvement in this organization, Weiss gradually became disillusioned with the traditional approach to art that it fostered. He left the Art Students League in search again for freedom. Just as his quest for political and personal liberation had carried him from a concentration camp to the United States, Weiss’ desire for artistic freedom demanded that he find a mode of painting and expression that he could own. Weiss enlisted in courses with the now-legendary Hans Hoffman. Time spent under the tutelage of this trailblazer of the Abstract Expressionist style opened Weiss’ eyes to a new thought process and way to approach and execute painting. He found lasting freedom and stylistic liberation in this movement. The very atmosphere of New York City directly impacted his nascent ventures into an 42 | September 2009 | Nashville Arts Magazine
exiting new style. “I spent quite a bit of time in New York. The sidewalks gave me so much energy…the energy of existence and travel and accidents that were on those sidewalks! I took a multitude of sidewalks, just sections of that sidewalk, all the way from the Village to Spring Street—and a lot of the paintings come from that.” In 1960, Weiss triumphantly returned to Nashville. He was armed with a new stylistic approach and full of the spirit and activity of the burgeoning New York arts scene. Photographs from this period capture a confident, masculine artist—the typical image of the Abstract Expressionist painter. Clinching a pipe between his teeth, a lock of hair carelessly falling over one eye, he wields authority over his canvases. Inside, though, the artist experienced trepidation about the manner in which the Nashville community would respond to his new art. To his surprise, both art and artist were embraced with excitement. He remains a local icon and holds historic importance to the Nashville area. He helped to found both the Tennessee Art League and the Tennessee Watercolor Society. Abstract Expressionism with its liberated attitude about what art is, and emphasis on the event of making it, allowed Weiss freedom of technique and execution that he exercises to the current date. Abandoning mimetic approaches, naturalism, and even paintbrushes, he brings a host of selfmade tools and unconventional approaches to work at his easel. He attacks the canvas with homemade trowels, power drills, and palette knives. Today, Weiss is more engrossed than ever in experimenting with “chaotic elements” that happen on his palette, more so than what he’s doing to the canvas, explaining, “I have total control on one hand what I’m composing, but I also have the chaotic experiences leading up to it.” Experimenting today means switching or changing his energy, doing something to stimulate himself to get over a stagnation in the process, in order to get to another plateau. The painting shown on the following page, bottom, is a work on a handmade metal substrate. Bright, almost bloody hues of red are modeled on the surface. They are scratched, scraped, and eventually diffused into a flesh-colored boundary at the edge of the painting. Divided into two uneven regions, the red fields are torn and dislocated from each other. In the empty, gray segment that divides the red zones, metal rings pierce the surface. The viewer cannot discern if the rings are there to suture a torn painting or torture and puncture the surface of the metal. These elements are synthetic at the same time that they are damaging and corrosive. This type of painting is essential to Weiss’ oeuvre. It asks the viewer questions rather than providing them with answers. It uses deconstructed elements, allowing the viewer to assimilate them mentally and recognize their original power as forms. Weiss combines the Abstract Expressionism that he learned from Hoffman with the technique of opaque transparency borrowed from painter Richard Diebenkorn. This style features the layering of numerous glazes to enliven and provide depth to the surface painting that meets the eye. Color is central to Weiss in achieving this phenomenon. He says, “There are certain colors that will react to certain situations. It’s very rare for me Nashville Arts Magazine | September 2009 | 43
to use the color purple. For me, it brings out too much of the dark side of an experience. Now red, most people say ‘red, blood.’ Whatever. It doesn’t matter to me. I think red is a very flamboyant color. . .. Most of [my paintings] are concerned with earth color. I don’t analyze myself and the reasoning for it, but, at the same time, this is how it happens.” Through courage and hard work, Anton Weiss has pursued political, personal, and artistic freedom throughout his life. He has taken part in trends and events that have become part of the fabric of twentieth-century history. In doing so, he has created an artistic legacy that is itself historic. Weiss’ personal life spans a constellation of cities in Europe and the United States. His art is known globally. And yet, he has chosen to be a local man. Through his work as director of the art department at Watkins and invaluable contributions to the Tennessee Art League and Tennessee Watercolor Society, he has shaped the Nashville arts community. A local treasure and an icon of a vital American style, he has enriched the lives of generations of artists and art lovers. He says, “I probably feel better about my painting process than I ever have—because it’s exciting!” Nashville shares his excitement. Anton has asked that we leave his images untitled for the article, preferring not to influence your perception of his art.
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(Laughs.) Everything that I achieved was mine. And it still is. It’s not going to reflect on my parents; nobody gave it to me. I created it, you see.
Anton Weiss The Interview
KS: Talk about your painting technique and what it is you want to accomplish.
by Katie Sulkowski | Photography by Anthony Scarlati
It was a beautiful sunny morning when Anton Weiss and I sat down for this interview. He came straight from his studio, creative and energized, a little guarded at first, but in no time we were into interesting waters. He looked a lot younger than I expected, dressed comfortably in his sandals and with a smile that simply wouldn’t quit. There was a lot of ground to cover. I knew he had survived 2½ years in a Russian concentration camp in Yugoslavia, and yet, rather than being bitter, he has found a way to accept it and to use the experience in a positive way. I thought it was a good place to start.
The experience for me is that you exist from one period to another period, and your experience is elevated automatically because you can’t help but gain knowledge. This is what I have lived. At the end of the day, I’ve gained a tiny bit of experience or knowledge,
AW:
“There is no such thing as a bad experience, if you use that experience
KS: Let’s start at the beginning. What was it like for you grow-
to your benefit....”
ing up during the war?
I was on my own a lot, especially for those 2½ years. I was 10 years old, and survival was the only solid issue that you were concerned with. They were trying to take those kids and convert them into Communism and control their destiny. My mother escaped from the camp six months before I did. I knew where she was crossing the border; in case something happened once I left the camp, I knew where to find her.
AW:
KS: You were 13 when you got out of the camp. Were you able to pursue art at that point?
Yes, when I went to apprentice in Austria. In the summertime, we didn’t go home or on vacation; we were allocated to do labor for the country, and you were paid while you performed those acts. It was such a beautiful experience. I loved it! Of course, when my parents decided to come to the States, I didn’t want to leave. Looking back now, the life that I chose, it’s all been good ever since then. I don’t have any complaints about life.
AW:
KW: Your father was employed by Peabody. What were you doing at that point in your life?
That’s right. My father wanted me to be something other than an artist. He said, you need to get a degree. I said, Dad I could care less about a degree; I want to paint! I signed up for two months at Peabody, and it didn’t take. I would spend more time with the teacher there, Alfred J. Pounders, in his private studio painting with him. So I said, why am I doing this? Pounders said the same thing: unless you’re going to be an educator, why are you going through this agony?
AW:
and what I did yesterday becomes obsolete. This is the process of putting pigment on top of pigment. I’ve learned you can become paint-transparent with opaque pigment. What that means is you will use a flat area of canvas, or whatever, then you will use overlays of another color, not necessarily a complementary color, but a color of your choice. And you will leave fragrances of the underneath color evident. And you do this like 20 times, and what happens in this sequence is you create depth. This is what I’m concerned with now; I’m painting with a concept of transparency, with an opaque fashion. This is where I departed from Hoffman. KS: As you’re painting and taking away from a surface, are there other things going in your mind; are you reaching back
The thing is, my father would never spend a dime on my art education. Not one single dime. And later, I found out why. He thought if this is something you’re passionate about, you agonize over it.
into the past when you paint?
Oh yes. Let’s put it this way—it may reach a point of explanation: your experiences that happen in the past, whether they were
AW:
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good, bad or whatever, they’re still experiences. The majority of the time if they were bad, you sort of block them out, and you erase those experiences. Well, I’ve never felt that way. I don’t feel bad about what happened to me. Those experiences make me a better individual, and I will perform in a much deeper sense than if I block them out. There is no such thing as a bad experience, if you use that experience to your benefit as a positive gesture of the future. For instance, a lot of people…you talk about disasters in society like concentration camps, even imprisonment or whatever— I could say to myself, the people that were behind those actions are shunned by me. I don’t feel bad about those things. I was in a Russian concentration camp. I can’t say to myself those people who were behind that were bad. They’re not. I don’t have anything against them, those people. But I think that you survive by that, and eventually it makes you a broader individual. If somebody does something, even in words or whatever, you know, does that person really realize what he said or what he did? A lot of times he doesn’t.
don’t have to be pretty in order to be appreciated. Take Goya for instance; they don’t have to be pleasant in order to be good. That’s all I’m saying. And it depends on the individual, how they want to approach life. I find myself digging into the past to be stimulated by a positive reaction to that. That’s all it is. KS: There must be a lot of chemical reactions going on inside of you when you’re at the easel.
Well, there is. There are certain colors that will react to certain situations. It’s very rare for me to use the color purple. For me, it brings out too much of the dark side of an experience. Now red, most people say red, blood, whatever—it doesn’t do that to me. I think red is a very flamboyant color. Now some of the purples, and sometimes deep blues, have a tendency of arousing a different reaction to my experience. Other artists may have completely different experiences. It’s very rare I will use purple in my paintings. The majority of them are concerned with earth color.
AW:
KS: How did you arrive at the techniques that you are using now? AW: When I changed from classical to abstract, I had to get rid of the classical instruments. It was a crazy process. You have this dictatorial message that your brain gives you if you hold a certain implement in your hand. This is what it’s going to do; this is what it’s sup-
I’m not saying it justifies what they did, but to me, see, I question my reaction to what they did they probably don’t even know; they’re probably not aware of what they did. That’s a matter of reactions to things that I may have said. KS: You said that sometimes being under stress or duress can actually make some of the best paintings.
For a period of time, I did some paintings that were related to those early experiences. What I find myself doing is reinitiating or digging up specifics of what happened. A revolt is stimulated within me, and I will probably exercise a much stronger action to that revolt than if I were to paint all pretty paintings. Paintings
AW:
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posed to do. This is what your teacher told you to do. But I didn’t want to do that. I had to change. At one point, I painted in watercolor and used an enamel palette, and the color came off in sheets. I thought, this is so beautiful; why can’t I put this back on my canvas. I enjoy painting more so than ever because I’m not afraid to venture. KS: Are you that way in life?
Yes. Most people don’t have the courage to make a statement. I enjoy the process. For a while, I was forcing it, but now I can always get a drill and a sanding pad and mutilate it…. And sometimes, I don’t know what the past will reveal. This is the beauty of it. It’s not just a process where you add and add and add. The majority of the time, depending on the material, you take away, and you leave whatever you feel is necessary.
AW:
AW:
elements that happen on my palette. It’s stimulating to me [because] they were not mixed on purpose. I’ll start out with a blank canvas with those elements, and then I’ll start filling in values and colors to connect those pieces. When I reveal it, I can feel the stress and activity and excitement of working this palette. I have total control on one hand, what I’m composing, but I also have the chaotic experiences leading up to it.
Prime example is the painting that’s in the gallery now. I literally had to go and scrape off 50 percent of the surface in order to regain the quality that I felt I needed. About a month later, I got it to a point where I’m satisfied with it. It revealed what I wanted it to reveal.
Just underneath the friendly exterior, I was surprised to learn how courageous this man is, to get in constant touch with those experiences of his past to instigate better painting, a better process, a better self. What surprised me the most is that he’s not afraid to go there, nor does he dwell on his past. Certainly, I’ll never forget his warm smile and Southern drawl. But, now that I know him, I’ll never forget his perspective on his own experiences. And what some would see only as a tragedy in the world, he has chosen to use for good in the creative process of his art.
KS: Where else do you find inspiration for your art?
Anton Weiss is represented locally by Leiper’s Creek Gallery and
KS: What do you do when a painting goes cold on you?
Let’s say if I worked on a painting for three or four days and the surface has gone dead—in order to reactivate, I will take a drill to rebel against my actions, to recover and go back. It’s almost like going back and rediscovering a day in the past. And you get a new insight, a new foundation, and go on.
AW:
Right now, I’m so engrossed with experimenting with chaotic
by Bennett Galleries in Knoxville and L Ross Gallery in Memphis.
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