Bernard Chaet: Songs of Joy by LewAllen Galleries

BERNARD CHAET

SONGS OF JOY

Girl with Towel on Her Head, 1970, oil on canvas, 70” x 40”

BernardChaet SONGS OF JOY SEPTEMBER 6 - OCTOBER 13. 2013

Railyard: 1613 Paseo De Peralta | Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 | tel 505.988.3250 Downtown: 125 West Palace Avenue | Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 | tel 505.988.8997 www.lewallencontemporary.com | info@lewallengalleries.com cover: September Storm, 1984-2001, oil on canvas, 42” x 60”

Bernard Chaet: SONGS OF JOY

Bernard Chaet, who died in October 2012 at the age of 88, enjoyed a distinguished 60-year career as an acclaimed American Modernist painter. He is known especially for his robust, tactile, expressionistic landscapes and seascapes painted during the latter decades of his life, as well as his earlier idiosyncratic, more constrained, figural and still-life paintings featuring a spare and flat form of realism. The paintings included in the current LewAllen exhibition serve both as a memorial to the life and career of this remarkable artist and man, as well as an engaging survey of each of these styles and periods.

He studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and then earned a B.A. at Tufts University. In addition to his renown as an accomplished painter, Chaet was also a respected arts educator who served for more than 40 years on the art faculty of the Yale School of Art, chairing it for a number of years and holding the Leffingwell chaired professorship of painting. He is credited along with his colleague and the acclaimed hard-edge abstractionist and Op Art pioneer, Josef Albers, with having transformed Yale’s traditional art program into a modern and progressive one that gained preeminent national prominence.

Pervading Chaet’s entire body of work is a resilient sense of enthusiasm for his subject matter and for the very delight of painting -- what one writer called Chaet’s “high spirits” -- a feeling that never waned throughout his long career. Perhaps it is best summed up by the artist’s own exclamation that “Every day is a good day for painting.”

Chaet exerted a vast amount of influence on countless students including celebrated artists such as Janet Fish, Chuck Close and Richard Sera to name just a few. Observing Chaet’s synergistic interplay of applied and academic art, realist painter and Yale colleague, William Bailey, noted “He is one of the great figures in American art … the greatest teachers I’ve known have been the greatest artists, and Bernie certainly fits that.”

Describing Chaet as having “one of the most respected names in American art,” the internationally prominent art historian and critic, Edward Lucie-Smith, also observed: “His painterly virtuosity and uncanny ability to turn color, texture and shape into emotional experience qualifies his canvases as worthy candidates for important collections of contemporary painting.” Indeed, they are included in those of such esteemed public institutions as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Chicago Art Institute, the Museum of Fine Art in Boston, to name but a few – as well as those of innumerable private collectors.

As a scholar, Chaet closely studied the methods, techniques and materials of painting and drawing from the Old Masters to the Impressionists, up to and through non-representational practitioners of numerous tendencies such as Abstract Expressionism, Color Field, Minimalism, and Hard Edge Geometric. From this research Chaet evolved his own manner of connecting materials and techniques to personal pictorial expression and also examined the myriad methods of historical masters in the several classic art texts he authored. These continue to inspire and guide both students and experienced artists. The Art of Drawing from 1970 and An Artist’s Notebook published in 1979 both serve as influential texts on the relationship between technical competence and creative excellence.

Truly a “painter’s painter,” Chaet was born in 1924 and grew up in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts.

In the earlier paintings of rooms, objects and people, there is a distinctive manner of drawing and rigorous line that yields tableaus of intimate experience – as though the artist is allowing peeks into a domestic life about which he is delighted to share his authentic joy in the commonplace. Chaet talked about his intent to “document” rooms in his homes and his family. The more restrained and structured interior composition from this earlier period plays into the subtleties of flat color plane interactions. They offer an intriguing glimpse of a more personal Chaet, and their domestic placidity contrasts with the energetic universality of the seascapes.

In these writings there are revealing insights into his own work guided by his fundamental view that technique and vision are inseparable. For example, Chaet’s luminous seascapes are acclaimed for their canny ability to evoke emotional response from the engaging sense of light that appears to emanate from the surface of the paintings. In An Artist’s Notebook Chaet expounds on paint handling techniques to create this signature “inner glow” from contrasting tonal values that transform pigment into light and the use of relational color vibrations to create light from space inside the picture plane. It is in large measure Chaet’s canny ability to stir emotions through his signature use of color, shape and light that characterizes his particular artistic genius. This capacity exists within both groups of work included in the current LewAllen exhibition.

Writing for the catalog that accompanied an exhibition of Chaet’s work at the Wichita Art Museum in 2011, Stephen Gleissner put it this way: “A belief that the objects and topography of our everyday lives possess and convey poetry and dignity is part of Chaet’s commitment to their representation.” A common denominator between both the landscapes and the views of interiors and people is a sense of resolute dedication to bringing forward this poetry from authentic interpretation of personal experience.

There is a sense of classicism in his work that suggests a profound respect for and subconscious connection with the past that is also notably free of emulation or convention. For him, tradition is juxtaposed with a clear feeling for improvisation. His pictures can be likened to a sort of visual jazz: riffs of loaded brushstrokes are pulled across the surface then released in lively syncopation; images are built layer upon layer with an obvious delight in the tactility of the paint; in the early interiors spare line and eccentric forms suggest freedom and the spontaneous.

In his highly regarded gestural seascapes, Chaet’s eloquence of rhythmic brushstroke combines with up-swelling color harmonies to create in the seascapes a near perfect equivalence between the visual sense of his work and the physical experience of standing perched amidst a rocky shoreline. These works reflect his experience of – rather than an effort to imitate – nature. They offer a vibrant and original interpretation of Chaet’s favorite subject, Cape Ann. As Chaet observed, “The themes of light and Cape Ann’s unique rock shapes have become, it seems, my primary focus.” He called the rocks there “his friends.”

In looking at Chaet’s highly original paintings it is possible to discern resonances with various techniques and effects he admired from predecessors. Lance Esplund wrote in Art in America: “[Chaet’s] best landscapes are reminiscent of the lyric simplicity of Constable, and in the seascapes we sense a profound engagement with the motif that recalls his American predecessors Dove and Marin.” Other writers have noted Chaet’s focus on structure inherited from Cezanne and Mondrian and, in his melding of landscape and abstraction, a regard for the tradition established by Van Gogh, Seurat, and Munch.

Cape Ann allowed him to explore material density and fluidity, and color and tonal interaction within his compositions that center on a spatial construction of bands of rock, water, and sky. The sun’s radiating verticality contrasts with the ocean’s vast horizontality. These landscapes suggest the artist’s sense of the magisterial universality of nature’s vastness.

Chaet’s use of heavy line and voluptuous forms also suggests an aesthetic kinship with Philip Guston and Marsden Hartley. His facility with color calls to mind the words of Andre Gide, who in 1905 wrote of Post-Impressionist painter Eduard Vuillard: “He explains each color by its neighbor and obtains from both a reciprocal response.” Similarly, Chaet talked of his own intent to produce pictorial effects by the way “one color touches another.” In his early room and figure paintings an affinity with the flattened form and reductive color areas associated with his friend and foremost American Modernist painter, Milton Avery, is evident. In comparing Chaet’s work of this period to that of Avery, Lucie-Smith noted approvingly the sense in both of “a kind of awkwardness that miraculously translates into elegance.”

In her essay for the catalogue of one of Chaet’s museum shows, art historian Isabelle Dervaux concludes: “Chaet has found the natural expression of the abstract ideas he pursues in his art, the balance of forms, colors, rhythms, and textures that best materialize his sensations and emotions on the canvas.” One of his former students at Yale, Frank Moore, wrote of his work: “Although it is keyed from observation, it is freed from the drudgery of simulation: it is allowed to sing.” Whether in the lyrical narratives of home and family or the innovative, visual rhythms of land, sea and sky forms populating his seascapes, Chaet was a maestro of making from drawing, paint and canvas extraordinary visual songs of joy.

Eddy, 1998-2002, oil on canvas, 24” x 26”

Yellow Sun, 2002, oil on canvas, 37” x 67”

The Orchard, 1961, oil on canvas, 48” x 40”

Rolling Clouds, 2004, oil on canvas, 30” x 36”

Rain, 2007, oil on canvas, 28” x 40”

Early Sun, 1989, oil on canvas, 40” x 42”

Folly Cove Low Tide, 2002, oil on canvas, 36” x 42”

Yellow Morning, 1996-1999, oil on canvas, 32” x 42”

White Dawn, 2006, oil on canvas, 30” x 42”

The Pool, 2002-2004, oil on canvas, 28” x 36”

Blue Sun II, 2003-2004, oil on canvas, 30” x 40”

Bass Rocks Angles, 1997-1998, oil on canvas, 30” x 30”

Sienna Haze, 1998-1999, oil on canvas, 24” x 36”

3 PM, 2002, oil on canvas, 20” x 40”

June Afternoon, 2009, oil on canvas, 24” x 19.75”

Green Sea, 2002, oil on canvas, 12” x 31”

May Light, 1974, oil on canvas, 49” x 43”

Sunday, 1974, oil on canvas, 54” x 44”

Girl with Red Painting, 1968, oil on canvas, 41” x 57”

March Window, 1971, oil on canvas, 50” x 36”

Bernard Chaet

Born: 1924, Boston, MA | Died: 2012, New Haven, CT Education: BA, 1947, Tufts University | School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 1973 1966 1962 1960 1959 1958 1956 1954 1954 1953 1951 1946

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2013 LewAllen Contemporary, Santa Fe, NM 2012 LewAllen Contemporary, Santa Fe, NM 2010 LewAllen Contemporary, Santa Fe, NM 2008 LewAllen Contemporary, Santa Fe, NM 2007 David Findlay Jr. Fine Art, New York, NY (7 shows since 1991) 2005-06 Butler Institute of Art, Youngstown, OH (painting retrospective), traveled to: Harnett Museum of Art, University of Richmond, VA; and Amherst College, MA 2004 Alpha Gallery, Boston, MA (10 shows since 1967) 2000 M B Modern, New York, NY (also 1998) 1998 M D Modern, Houston, TX 1991 Marilyn Pearl Gallery, New York, NY (9 shows 1977-91) 1990-92 Boston Public Library (drawing retrospective), traveled to: Yale University; University of Louisville; Southern Methodist University; University of Montana; Holter Museum, Helena, MT; Indiana University; University of Michigan; College of William and Mary; and Maryland Institute College of Art 1989 Jane Haslem Gallery, Washington, DC (also 1973) 1989 J. Rosenthal fine Arts, Chicago, IL (also 1986) 1986 Jaffe-Friede Gallery, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH 1982 Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington, DE 1979 Marilyn Pearl Gallery, New York, NY, traveled to: College of William and Mary; Hermitage Foundation Museum; University of North Carolina, Greensboro 1975 Forum Gallery, New York, NY 1972 Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, PA 1970 Brockton Art Center, Brockton, MA (retrospective) 1969 University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 1967 Stable Gallery, New York, NY (also 1959, 1961) 1965 Boris Mirski Gallery, Boston, Ma 1961 White Museum, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 1954 Bertha Shaefer Gallery, New York, NY SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2007 National Academy of Design 2006 Harnett Museum of Art, University of Richmond, VA 2002 New York Studio, New York, NY 2002 Boston University Art Gallery, Boston, MA 2000 Chicago Art Institiute, Chicago, IL 1995 Danforth Museum of Art, Framingham, MA 1991 Art Institute of Boston, MA 1989 Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC 1984 Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, NY 1983 Weatherspoon Art Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, NC

Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY Corcoran Gallery, Washington, DC Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, CT The Phillips Collection, Washington, DC Detroit Art Institute, Detroit, MI Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY Fort Worth Museum, Fort Worth, TX Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA San Franscisco Art Institute, San Franscisco, CA DeCordova Museum, Lincoln, MA Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA

SELECTED AWARDS 2007 National Academy, Edwin Palmer Memorial Prize (also 2001) 2003 National Academy, Henry Ward Ranger, Purchase Prize 2001 American Academy of Arts and Letters, Jimmy Ernst Prize 1999 National Academy, Edwin Palmer Landscape Prize 1997 National Academy, Benjamin Altman Landscape Prize 1986 American Academy of Arts and Letters, Child Hassam Fund Purchase 1981 American Academy of Arts and Letters, Hassam and Speicher Fund Purchase

SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover, MA Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY Brown University, Providence, RI Chicago Art Institute, Chicago, IL DeCordova Museum, Lincoln, MA Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC Hood Museum, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe, NM New York Public Library, New York, NY Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Providence, RI Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC State University of New York, Cortland, NY Weatherspoon Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, NC Wight Gallery, University of California, Los Angeles, CA Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT