Barbara Ernst Prey | |
---|---|
Born | Barbara Elizabeth Ernst 1957 New York, New York |
Nationality | American |
Education | Williams College Harvard University |
Known for | Painting |
Awards | Fulbright Scholarship, 1979 Henry Luce Grant, 1986 New York State Women of Distinction Award, 2004 |
Barbara Ernst Prey (born 1957, New York City) [1] is an American artist who specializes in the art of watercolor. [2] In 2008 Prey was appointed to the National Council on the Arts, the advisory body of the National Endowment for the Arts. [3] In 2015, MASS MoCA commissioned Barbara Prey to create the world's largest known watercolor painting [4] (8 by 15 feet) for its new Building 6, which opened in Spring 2017. She has worked in oil painting and illustration, the latter of which she contributed to The New Yorker for a decade. She currently works and lives in Long Island, New York, Maine and Williamstown, Massachusetts.
Barbara Ernst Prey was born in New York City in 1957. Her mother Peggy Ernst was an artist and Head of the Design Department at New York City's Pratt Art Institute. Prey cites her mother as one of her greatest influences and inspirations. [5] At 16 she was awarded a summer scholarship to the San Francisco Art Institute. [6] She was 17 when Governor Hugh Carey purchased one of her early oil paintings. [7]
Prey received her B.A. in Art History with Honors from Williams College in 1979 where she was mentored by Lane Faison [7] and a master's degree from Harvard University in 1986. [3] A 2007 article in USA Today stated that "Prey's academic studies at Williams College with the art historian Lane Faisson, and at Harvard University provide the connection between art and art history that so strongly informs her work." [8] After an internship at The Metropolitan Museum in New York City, she was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship, enabling her to spend two years in southern Germany where she studied, worked and exhibited extensively. She then worked for a year as a personal assistant-court painter to Prince Albrecht Castell-Castell. [7] A grant from The Henry Luce Foundation from 1986 to 1987 to Tainan, Taiwan, where she was a visiting professor in Western art, enabled her to continue to study with several Chinese master painters. [5] She continued to exhibit in Asia where she painted her first large, full-sheet paintings. [9]
Returning to New York in 1981 from her studies and exhibits in Europe, Prey lived in New York City where she worked in the Modern Painting Department at Sothebys. It was also at this time that she began to focus intently on drawing, and to sell her work to publications such as The New Yorker , which bought and reproduced her illustrations for over ten years. Magazines such as Gourmet , Good Housekeeping , Horticulture, as well as The New York Times followed suit, granting wide exposure. [10]
During this time, Prey continued work on her watercolors. [10] She began selling her work to family and friends, then made sales through private exhibitions and social gatherings, eventually retaining representation with numerous galleries. [11]
Prey's work has been featured in many national and international exhibits. For the past three years, her work has been featured in the Smithsonian Traveling Exhibit: NASA Art: 50 Years of Exploration; [12] and selected pieces can be found on exhibit at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC and at the Kennedy Space Center. In 2008 the Mona Bismarck Foundation in Paris, France presented the retrospective An American View: Barbara Ernst Prey. [13] Preys painting "Parade Route" was chosen to be exhibited at the U.S. Embassy Hong Kong in 2015. [14]
Prey was commissioned by NASA to paint four paintings for their collection. [15] She has painted the x-43, the world's fastest aircraft; a commemorative work for the anniversary of the Space Shuttle Columbia tragedy titled "The Columbia Tribute; a rendition of the International Space Station"; and a painting of the Space Shuttle Discovery titled "Shuttle Discovery: Return to Flight". [16] In 2003, Prey was commissioned by the President and First Lady to paint the official White House Christmas Card. [17] Prey's painting is included in the White House permanent collection. [18] In 2004 the New York State Senate honored Prey with the Senate's "Women of Distinction Award". [19] Prey was also honored by the Heckscher Museum of Art at their 2011 Celebrate Achievement Gala for her achievements and contribution to American art and culture. Heckscher Museum Director Michael Schantz stated, "Barbara is one of America's most gifted watercolorists whose works are rooted in the grand traditions of American landscape painting." [20] In 2008, Prey was appointed by the President and approved by the Senate to the National Council of the Arts, which advises the National Endowment for the Arts. [21] Chairman Dana Gioia stated to ARTFORUM "Barbara Prey's nomination continues our tradition of having prominent visual artists as members of the National Council of the Arts." [22] She has lectured at the National Gallery of Art, [23] Corcoran Gallery of Art, [24] Dartmouth College, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Thyssen Bornemisza Museum Madrid. [25] In 2015 Prey's painting The Collection was selected by the U.S. State Department as the July 4th image for every U.S. Ambassador and Embassy invitation around the world for their Embassy celebrations. [26] Prey has been commissioned by Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) to paint a monumental watercolor for their new Building 6. Prey's 8 x 15 feet interior portrait "MASS MoCA Building 6" is said to be the world's largest watercolor. [4] [27]
Prey is both an oil and water color painter but her primary medium is watercolor. She has said, "watercolor is a lot like jazz you kind of know where you're going, but you're going off along the way." [6] She has expressed an interest in the use of strong color, especially applied to her study of Maine landscapes; "A clear blue sky speaks to your soul — it's like a piece of music." [28] Referring to her White House Christmas card in 2003, an article in The New Yorker stated that "Barbara Prey, may be, at this moment, the most widely viewed painter in the world." [29] David Mitten, curator of the Harvard Art Museums, described Prey's paintings as, "Partaking of the universal values of light and color, while creating coherent evocative spaces of great beauty and enduring significance." [30] In 2015 Prey was appointed to the board of the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg." [31] [32]
Sarah Cash of the National Gallery of Art has said that Prey's works "connects us, as viewers, to the land (and the sea); these scenes link us to place, history, and elemental human pursuits in the face of our frenetic, technology-dominated lives. The pristine landscapes and seascapes… suggest the power and permanence of nature in contrast to the relative transience of human life. Our imaginations are not only enticed by the houses, boats and sheds themselves, but also by the exquisitely wrought details that animate the compositions." [33] The idea of American identity plays a large role in Prey's work both in subject matter and context. An article in The Wall Street Journal stated, "Drawing from the tradition of renowned American artists such as Winslow Homer and Edward Hopper, contemporary artist Barbara Ernst Prey's watercolors evoke symbols of the US" [34]
MASS MoCA, The Brooklyn Museum, The National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., The White House, The Smithsonian American Art Museum, Kennedy Space Center, Williams College, Williams College Museum of Art, Hood Museum, Dartmouth College, The New-York Historical Society Museum, The George W. Bush Presidential Library and Center, The Farnsworth Art Museum, The Taiwan Museum of Art, Mellon Hall, Harvard Business School, The Henry Luce Foundation, Reader's Digest Corporation and NASA Headquarters. [35]
Gwendolyn Clarine Knight was an American artist who was born in Bridgetown, Barbados, in the West Indies.
Alma Woodsey Thomas was an African-American artist and teacher who lived and worked in Washington, D.C., and is now recognized as a major American painter of the 20th century. Thomas is best known for the "exuberant", colorful, abstract paintings that she created after her retirement from a 35-year career teaching art at Washington's Shaw Junior High School.
Yvonne Helene Jacquette was an American painter, printmaker, and educator. She was known in particular for her depictions of aerial landscapes, especially her low-altitude and oblique aerial views of cities or towns, often painted using a distinctive, pointillistic technique. Through her marriage with Rudy Burckhardt, she was a member of the Burckhardt family by marriage. Her son is Tom Burckhardt.
Colin Campbell Cooper, Jr. was an American impressionist painter of architectural paintings, especially of skyscrapers in New York City, Philadelphia, and Chicago. An avid traveler, he was also known for his paintings of European and Asian landmarks, as well as natural landscapes, portraits, florals, and interiors. In addition to being a painter, he was also a teacher and writer. His first wife, Emma Lampert Cooper, was also a highly regarded painter.
Thelma Beatrice Johnson Streat (1912–1959) was an African-American artist, dancer, and educator. She gained prominence in the 1940s for her art, performance and work to foster intercultural understanding and appreciation.
Lowell Blair Nesbitt was an American painter, draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor. He served as the official artist for the NASA Apollo 9, and Apollo 13 space missions; in 1976 the United States Navy commissioned him to paint a mural in the administration building on Treasure Island spanning 26 feet x 251 feet, then the largest mural in the United States; and in 1980 the United States Postal Service honored Lowell Nesbitt by issuing four postage stamps depicting his paintings.
Timothy J. Clark is an American artist best known for his large watercolor paintings of urban landscapes, still lifes, and interiors, and for his oil and watercolor portraits. His paintings and drawings are in the permanent collections of more than twenty art museums.
Nita Engle was an American watercolorist. She worked as an art director and magazine illustrator and exhibited in and out of the United States. Engle received several awards, including an honorary doctorate from Northern Michigan University. A documentary was made about her entitled Wilderness Palette - Nita Engle in Michigan and she wrote the book How to Make a Watercolor Paint Itself: Experimental Techniques for Achieving Realistic Effects.
Paul Hampden Dougherty was an American marine painter. Dougherty was recognized for his American Impressionism paintings of the coasts of Maine and Cornwall in the years after the turn of the 20th century. His work has been described as bold and masculine, and he was best known for his many paintings of breakers crashing against rocky coasts and mountain landscapes. Dougherty also painted still lifes, created prints and sculpted.
Jennie Augusta Brownscombe was an American painter, designer, etcher, commercial artist, and illustrator. Brownscombe studied art for years in the United States and in Paris. She was a founding member, student and teacher at the Art Students League of New York. She made genre paintings, including revolutionary and colonial American history, most notably The First Thanksgiving held at Pilgrim Hall in Plymouth, Massachusetts. She sold the reproduction rights to more than 100 paintings, and images of her work have appeared on prints, calendars and greeting cards. Her works are in many public collections and museums. In 1899 she was described by New York World as "one of America's best artists."
Barbara Takenaga is an American artist known for swirling, abstract paintings that have been described as psychedelic and cosmic, as well as scientific, due to their highly detailed, obsessive patterning. She gained wide recognition in the 2000s, as critics such as David Cohen and Kenneth Baker placed her among a leading edge of artists renewing abstraction with paintings that emphasized visual beauty and excess, meticulous technique, and optical effects. Her work suggests possibilities that range from imagined landscapes and aerial maps to astronomical and meteorological phenomena to microscopic views of cells, aquatic creatures or mineral cross-sections. In a 2018 review, The New Yorker described Takenaga as "an abstractionist with a mystic’s interest in how the ecstatic can emerge from the laborious."
Mindy Weisel is an American abstract visual artist and author.
Carol Brown Goldberg is an American artist working in a variety of media. While primarily a painter creating heavily detailed work as large as 10 feet by 10 feet, she is also known for sculpture, film, and drawing. Her work has ranged from narrative genre paintings to multi-layered abstractions to realistic portraits to intricate gardens and jungles.
Elsie Lower Pomeroy (1882-1971) was an artist most closely associated with the American Scene Painting movement and specifically California Regionalism or California Scene Painting. She was also one of a small group of botanical illustrators who worked for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) in the early 20th century.
Z. Vanessa Helder was an American watercolor painter who gained national attention in the 1930s/40s, mainly for her paintings of scenes in Eastern Washington. She painted with a bold, Precisionist style not commonly associated with watercolor, rendering landscapes, industrial scenes, and houses with a Magic Realist touch that gave them a forlorn, isolated quality, somewhat in the manner of Charles Sheeler and Edward Hopper. She spent most of her career in the Pacific Northwest, but was popular in New York art galleries, was a member of the National Association of Women Painters and Sculptors, and, in 1943, was included in a major exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art.
Jan Serr is an American visual artist who produces a wide range of art including oil paintings, drawings, photographs and prints such as monotypes, lithographs, and etchings.
Edda Renouf is an American painter and printmaker. Renouf creates minimalist abstract paintings and drawings developed from her close attention to subtle properties of materials, such as the woven threads in linen canvas and the flax and cotton fibers of paper. Renouf often alters these supports by removing threads from the weave of a canvas, or in her drawings, creating lines by incising the paper.
Michele Martin Taylor, is an American fine art painter. She is best known for her Post-Impressionist works in oil, watercolor and intaglio. Her subjects are often gardens, water and verdure, but also portraits, figural studies and interiors.
Margaret Casey Gates (1903–1989) was an American artist, painter, art teacher and administrator. She participated in the New Deal's Section of Painting and Sculpture under the Treasury Department, creating the post office mural for Mebane, North Carolina, and a watercolor which was held at Fort Stanton in New Mexico. In addition, she has paintings held in several noted collections in the United States.
Nadine M. DeLawrence was an American visual artist and educator. She worked as a sculptor, installation artist, painter, and printmaker. Her artwork was influenced by her interest in African religions and she created large scale installations out of sculptures made in aluminum and steel. She also went by the married name Nadine DeLawrence Maine.