It is the special privilege of the fine artist to reveal immediate data with a clarity, intensity and purity that promotes them to a special degree of reality.
I can be so involved that I am no longer conscious of my needs or even of any pains. But there also have been many times when I felt the exhaustion - when it was physically painful, but I just couldn't stop.
My art career actually began under the kitchen table. My mother wanted to get me out of her hair while she cooked, so she laid out some paper and pencils on the floor under the kitchen table.
I have, at times, been absorbed in my work to the point of complete self-oblivion. Once I worked for thirty-six hours without a break - to complete exhaustion; and while I was in the middle of it I didn't even notice.
Every canvas that can awaken us more exquisitely and accurately to the infinite and various surface of our experience does that much to sharpen life, and thereby render it more alive.
Every single person is unlike anyone else. Therefore, in creating a portrait of someone... we must look carefully to catch that particular unique quality. In fact, we can neglect nothing because everything we select or do sends a message to the observer.
I live an artistic double life: one of classical realism and the other of aesthetic exploration.
In the Fragments, sensations are more profound and richly clarified through deliberate and explicit pattern; emotions are given a sequence and development such as the exigencies of practical life rarely permit.
Art is the lens through which I experience the world. Art is the medium to present the human condition... love, fear, bewilderment, pleasure, distaste, brotherhood and all the subtleties that we all know.
There is a kinship between music and painting - with the same words used to describe both, as when a musical composition is said to have color and a painting to have rhythm.
Author details
Alton Tobey: Biography and Life Work
Alton Tobey was a notable American painter. The story of Alton Tobey began on November 5, 1914 in Middletown, Connecticut. The legacy of Alton Tobey continues today, following their passing on January 4, 2005 in Mamaroneck, New York.
Alton Stanley Tobey (November 5, 1914 – January 4, 2005) was an American painter , historical artist , muralist , portraitist , illustrator , and teacher of art.
Legacy and Personal Influence
Academic foundations were established at Yale University, School of Fine Arts. Historically, their work is best remembered for historical painting.
Major Contributions
- historical painting
- illustration
- murals
- portraits
Philosophical Views and Reflections
His murals on historical subjects are the most widely seen of Tobey's works, prominently displayed in many public places in the US and elsewhere. These include public institutions in his native Connecticut ; the Smithsonian Institution and other venues in Washington, DC ; New York's Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum ; and even an officers club in Saudi Arabia . Indeed, the Larchmont Gazette obituary (see 'External links') states, "Alton Tobey was best known for the murals, which he called 'symphonies of painting'." Alton Tobey was president of the National Society of Mural Painters from 1984 to 1988.
Also in a modern (or even postmodern ) vein are his series of "fragments": bizarre portraits , mostly of famous people, consisting of extreme closeups of only parts of (usually) the head or face, often far off-center. A particularly amusing example is "Thatcher's Thatch", consisting only of the British Prime Minister 's famous hairdo jutting up from the bottom of the canvas. There are also grotesque and piercingly angry paintings of social commentary, sometimes verging on protest art , such as "Our Hero", an over-muscled monster with a tiny infant's head, embodying belligerent and stupid militarism . A portrait of Ronald Reagan called The Making of a President shows the President's head bizarrely stretched and multiplied across the canvas into a menacing, many-eyed creature, culminating on the far right with a disembodied Reagan smile hovering mid-air, bounded by sphincterish wrinkles which extend into the smoky brown background. It would not appear to express reverence or affection.
