Love: Corita Kent by Maine College of Art

LOVE: CORITA KENT

rtist, educator, social justice advocate, and positive rebel Corita Kent was the nun that everyone wanted to meet. Corita was a teacher in, and later the head of, the art department at Immaculate Heart College. While well versed in all mediums, she reinvigorated the whole element of serigraphy (silkscreening), which wasn’t very popular at the time. She took up serigraphy while finishing her graduate degree, finding it to be the perfect art form to be expressive and vocal through color, form, and type, as well as being affordable and widely available. Corita’s emphasis on printing was partially due to her wish for political outreach, as she strived to create affordable art for the masses. But while Corita’s work had deep spiritual convictions and a sense of positive rebelion, form always came first, and content next.

Look, 1965 Serigraph 24" x 18"

Manflowers, 1969 Serigraph 23" x 12"

LOVE: CORITA KENT

For Emergency Use Soft Shoulder, 1966 Serigraph 36" x 30"

MOTIVES orita’s slogan for the Art Department at Immaculate Heart College was, “We have no art, we do everything as well as we can.” This tended to be a slogan for more than just the art department, but for herself as well. Corita’s art was more than just her art, it was her activism — a social commentary that promoted love and tolerance. She had a spiritually-informed outlook on her work and the messages they were to convey, particularly looking to engage people in their everyday lives. By using art as a form for spreading her ideals of peace, her intense two-dimensional and typographic compositions housed messages that evoked joy, humor, surprise, hope, and love — all of which emerged from the deepest of her spiritual convictions.

Christ and Mary, 1969 Serigraph 18.25" x 12.5"

RELIGIOUS INFLUENCE he first of Corita’s serigraphy work was influenced by the medieval art she had been studying. This work was primarily iconographic — drawing inspiration and material from the Bible and other religious sources — with great abstract expressionist influence, formally. Her use of text in her prints quickly grew, as she featured scripture passages and positive quotes. At first, the text and image worked together, creating a synonymous, wholesome message, until the type grew bolder and more saturated — replacing imagery as the most important element.

As her work evolved, so did her view of the church. With the new exploration in form that saw vibrant colors and type replace holy imagery, her work became aesthetic declarations of religious independence. There were many ongoing politics and fights within the church community at that time, and while she stayed away from them physically and verbally, her prints did the talking for her — straying away from traditional and acceptable church representations, towards work that embodied her spirit and acted as a genuine and heartfelt rebellion.

Corita’s work continued to separate her from the church as her form, color, and inspiration shifted to a more contemporary sphere. While her messages were still spiritual and holy, the pop-art-like aesthetic was at the forefront of her work, skewing the messages to have a less important and more abstract interpretation. This contemporary work resulted in her 1964 poster, The Juiciest Tomato of Them All — a repurposed slogan from Del Monte canned tomatoes paired with praise of the Virgin Mary — being declared sacrilegious, and banned from public display by the Cardinal.

LOVE: CORITA KENT

The Juciest Tomato of them All, 1964 Serigraph 29.75" x 36"

Maryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Heart, 1960 Serigraph 10.5" x 7.75"

LOVE: CORITA KENT

CONTEMPORARY INFLUENCE t’s easy for one Corita not only referenced to ignore Coricontemporary culture and polita’s religious or tics, but understood and found spiritual messages, interest in them as well. Doris especially since form comes Donnelly, a fellow nun at Imfirst, and content follows. This maculate Heart College, noted: form-heavy aesthetic can be “This is the early ‘60s. In general, accredited to the Pop art movenuns wouldn’t know the Beatles. ment that developed around her But, she knew the Beatles. She in Los Angeles during the early understood and celebrated the 1960s. As religious imagery fadlyrics of the Beatles.” In fact, ed out, her screen prints began in her 1965 piece Look, Kent incorporating the archetypical quoted the Beatles’ “Things We product of brands of AmeriSaid Today,” which utilizes the can consumerism and vibrant logo from Look magazine paired saturated colors, all still alongwith the song lyrics “Love is side spiritual texts. Her design here to stay. And that’s enough.” process involved appropriating (Look on page 01). advertisements and product Corita’s serigraph prints are branding to suit her own ideas. joyful explosions of appropriatShe would tear, rip, or crumble ed advertising slogans and logos, images and cut-out advertisereconfigured into messages ments then re-photograph them. aimed towards faith and spirituShe often paired the repurposed al joy. While still religious, her advertisement type with texts work of this time was centered from scriptures, newspaper, around social activism and movsong lyrics, or writings from faing away from the confinements mous writers such as Gertrude of the institutionalized and Stein, Albert Camus, and her male dominated Church. favorite, E. E. Cummings.

Previous Spread: Sister Corita Kent in front of her work at Immaculate Heart College, 1964 Corita Art Center Left: Christ and Mary, 1969 Serigraph 18.25" x 12.5"

Love Your Brother, 1969 Serigraph 22.5" x 11.5"

Ribbons of the World, 1978 Serigraph 9" x 22.875"

LATER WORK & LEGACY n 1968 Corita finally left the Church and pursued being a full-time artist. For a few more years her work continued down the path of pop-art with highly saturated colors and appropriated imagery, until it slowly eased up and was replaced by a very peaceful and illustrative style. Repurposed advertisements and distorted imagery were replaced with hand drawn flowers, hearts, and washes of color. The geometric and industrial type was also replaced for her elegant handwriting that continued to display religious and spiritual quotes from famous writers and herself. Corita carried out these tender and loving greeting-cardlike prints until 1986 when she succumbed to cancer â&#x20AC;&#x201D; always using shape, color, and type harmoniously, keeping form first, and content second. Over her 30-year career as an artist, Corita created several hundred serigraph designs for posters, book covers, and murals. Some her most notable commissions

are: a stamp design for the U.S. Postal Service in 1985 based on her favorite theme â&#x20AC;&#x201D; love (of which over 700 million were sold). She also created Rainbow Swash, a mural designed in 1971 which stands as the largest copyrighted work of art in the world, covering a 150-foot high natural gas tank in Boston, a work for the 1964 Worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Fair in New York, and the 1965 ibm Christmas display in New York. Although claiming to be nothing more than a teacher, Corita was an artist, designer, and social justice advocate whose growing contemporary fame led to a brutal workload for someone who had pledged her life to service. Whether you chose to ignore her messages or not, her beautiful prints are to be admired in every way. She pairs incredible 2D form with layers of heartfelt thought, and while her pieces may speak separately to joy, humor, surprise, and hope, one idea we can take away from every mark and word on every print is love.

LOVE: CORITA KENT

With Love to the Everyday Miracle, 1967 Serigraph 35" x 23"

LOVE: CORITA KENT

BIBLIOGRAPHY Barnett, David C. “A Nun Inspired By Warhol: The Forgotten Pop Art Of Sister Corita Kent.” NPR, January 8, 2015. https://www.npr. org/2015/01/08/375856633/a-nun-inspired-by-warhol-the-forgotten-pop-artof-sister-corita-kent Corita Art Center. “About Corita.” About. Last modified 2019. http://corita.org/ about-corita. Dackerman, Susan. “Corita Kent” AIGA, 2016. https://www.aiga.org/medalist-corita-kent-2016 Wild, Lorraine. “Sister Corita: The Juiciest Tomato” Design Observer, January 9, 2007. https://designobserver.com/ feature/sister-corita-the-juiciest-tomato/5097

COVER IMAGE: Yes #3, 1979 Serigraph 20" x 20" BACK COVER IMAGE: For Anais, 1978 Serigraph 23" x 23"

Love is Hard Work, 1985 Serigraph 18" x 24"