Charles Wysocki

 

Charles M. Wysocki, Jr. (1928-2002) was an American painter, whose works depict a stylized version of American life of yesteryear, mostly during the horse and buggy era. Born in Detroit, Michigan, in spent a two-year hitch in the US Army before entering the Art Center School in Los Angeles under the G.I. bill. There, he focused in the field of commercial art, spending four years in Detroit where his illustrations were used in Dodge trucks, Unocal, Carnation, and Dow Chemical Company advertisements. He returned to Los Angeles where he helped to form a freelance advertising agency. Because of his wife's heritage in the San Fernando Valley, Wysocki came to appreciate a simpler, more rural life. Together they made many trips to New England, which served to nurture his interest in early American folk art. He continued his lucrative commercial artwork for a time, but eventually devoted all of his attention to this new interest. In his Americana paintings, Wysocki usually included an American flag, something many admires enjoyed locating.

The Abstract Dutch Master

 

On this date in 1940, Piet Mondrian (1872-1944), moved permanently to New York City. The Dutch painter and art theoretician is regarded as a pioneering artist of abstract art in the 20th century, influencing many others to follow. Though his early paintings reflected an impressionistic style, he changed direction from figurative painting to an increasingly abstract style, ultimately reaching a point where his artistic signature was reduced to the simplest geometric elements during the 1920s as shown above. Outside the artist community, his work was not entirely comprehended though his trademark of colorful, geometric paintings did become popular fashion design elements or for consumer products twenty years after his death. Works from his later period are visually complicated with more lines placed in an overlapping arrangement that is nearly cartographical in appearance. He obsessed over these paintings to the point where his own hands blistered or he made himself sick. Perhaps the mark of another misunderstood artistic genius.

The Lady and The Walt

 

Mary Blair (1911-1978) was one of Walt Disney’s favorite artists, joining The Walt Disney Company in 1940 where she created concept paintings for projects related to Fantasia (1940), Dumbo (1941), and The Lady and the Tramp (1955). Blair learned her craft at The Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles in the mid-1930s. She and her husband, Lee Blair, also a Disney employee, accompanied Disney and several of his artists on a South American tour in 1941. Upon their return, Blair created concept art that ended up being used for films inspired by the trip. Her imagination and use of bright colors was a perfect fit for Disney's fantasy films but left Disney in 1953 to concentrate on illustrating children’s books, most notably, a series of Little Golden Books. Walt Disney did convince Blair to work on Disney’s contribution to the 1964 World’s Fair in New York. Her concept art on this project would be her final major design work for Disney. The “It's a Small World” ride proved extremely popular and was later adapted for Disneyland and Disney World.