Top Twenty

Albert Pinkham Ryder by Marsden Hartley

I had thought about putting together what I consider the top ten greatest artist of all time. But then I couldn't decide what "great" really meant. It is not merely most important, meaning most influential, but also having a timeless quality. An example would be my friend Andy Warhol. I must grudgingly admit he is the most important, influential artist of the second half of the twentieth century extending into the present. But I feel that influence has been so damaging to the humanist tradition of painting that I can not consider him great. All I could come up with was three and one of those was a tie. They are (in order) Michelangelo, van Gogh/ Gauguin and Picasso with perhaps (don't know) maybe Giotto or Courbet or Manet? And I guess maybe the whole ancient Greek sculpture/ architecture team. So I put together a list of my top ten favorite artists:


1. Michelangelo

2. van Gogh

3. Gauguin

4. Picasso

5. Beckmann

6. Guston

7. Hartley

8. Bacon

9. Titian

10. Cornell

And now for the next ten:

11. Ryder

12. William Blake

13. Kitaj

14. Manet

15. de Kooning

16. Winslow Homer

17. The Mystical Beuys

18. Matisse

19. Gorky

20. Morris Graves

Of course this list can and will change without notice on the wings of whimsey. Notice that I am mostly attracted to dead artists. What can I say? Next I will try to put together a list of living artist I can tolerate. Pardon me for being a misanthrope!

Favorite Artist #12

Albert Pinkham Ryder

Albert Pinkham Ryder by Marsden Hartley

It is the idea of Ryder that captures our imagination. He painted with such disregard for his materials that most of his works today exist only in a highly degraded condition. He was the ultimate romantic painter truly caring only about the act of painting, his vision and the immediate gratification the work brought him. He must have had some inkling, as he was pouring shiny gummy varnish mixtures over undried paint, that what he saw then would not last. Whenever he showed visitors a painting he would attempt to resurrect the deep translucent tones by pouring water over it, allowing a momentary glimpse, below the dull clouds, of a surface that use to radiate. Ryder was probably the only person ever to see the real beauty he had created. There is something deeply moving in seeing his bubbling cracking paint and knowing that all beauty ends in destruction. That so many artist today start with the impermanent as an end shows their disregard for the true existential struggles of the artist. You can't "make" Ryders you have to live them.

Francis Bacon - On Life, Death, and Gambling

Favorite Artist #11

Leon Golub

Spanish Dictator Francisco Franco

Mark Warren "Leni Riefenstahl" 48" X 58" oil on linen

A Modern Day  Masaccio

I recently published my current top ten artists. Now I will display # 11-20  one at a time.

Toppish Ten

I had thought about putting together what I consider the top ten greatest artist of all time. But then I couldn't decide what "great" really meant. It is not merely most important, meaning most influential, but also having a timeless quality. An example would be my friend Andy Warhol. I must grudgingly admit he is the most important, influential artist of the second half of the twentieth century extending into the present. But I feel that influence has been so damaging to the humanist tradition of painting that I can not consider him great. All I could come up with was three and one of those was a tie. They are (in order) Michelangelo, van Gogh/ Gauguin and Picasso with perhaps (don't know) maybe Giotto or Courbet or Manet? And I guess maybe the whole ancient Greek sculpture/ architecture team.

So instead I decided to form my own top ten favorite artist list and here I don't need to know why. This list is good only for February 6, 2011 between the hours of 10 pm and midnight. In no particular order:

1.Michelangelo

2.van Gogh

3.Gauguin

4.Picasso

5.Beckmann

6. Guston

7.Hartley

8.Bacon

9.Titian

10.Cornell

Maybe Next I will tackle the next ten on the list. I think that will be much more interesting and possibly revealing.