He was most famous for his Helga paintings, and for Christina's World, but I loved him because of his other works. I was lucky enough to get to see an exhibition of his work at the Nelson-Atkins Museum. And in person, they were breathtaking. Some of them were practically 3-dimensional and others looked like photographs, with the amount of realism in them. What I really loved about them is how they celebrated the New England landscape and how they weren't about people, even when people were in them. It was as if the people were part of their surroundings, that those surroundings were what were being reveled in. And he wasn't afraid about the stillness that comes with being alone:
"I do an awful lot of thinking and dreaming about things in the past and the future ~ the timelessness of the rocks and the hills ~ all the people who have existed there. I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure in the landscape ~ the loneliness of it ~ the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it; the whole story doesn't show. I think anything like that ~ which is contemplative, silent, shows a person alone ~ people always feel is sad. Is it because we've lost the art of being alone?"
Here's a few of my favorites:
The last one, Ericksons, sold at Christies for $10.3M. The right side of the kitchen, the part without Mr. Erickson in it, seriously looks like a photograph.
I feel sad that he is gone because he won't be making any more paintings, but I feel gratified to know that he was awarded the National Medal of the Arts in 2007 as well as the Congressional Gold Medal.
Some of his obits:
Artadox
Obit Magazine
New York Times
NPR
Pau Surribas
Washington Post
Other links of interest:
ArtNet.com Article "Andrew Wyeth at 82"
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