The flag has been the subject of many artists' work Johns is not unique in that endeavor, though he is perhaps among the most famous, if not most enigmatic, depicters of Old Glory. Gazing through the lens of the moment's political and social climate and trying to understand Johns' 'flags' accordingly, means contextualizing the art. This doesn't really seem a coincidence, as art, culture and current events all seem to have a rather curious way of converging on provocatively interpretable planes. Two of the artist's most iconic works, 'Flag' and 'Three Flags,' have been given the lion's share of the press for the 'Mind/Mirror' exhibition. So what exactly is Jasper Johns' 'private experience' of the public symbol that is the American flag? This is of course a question the artist has never really answered, but one nevertheless that a number of his paintings with their recurring stars-and-stripes motif poses. His party-line response when asked about his fascination with the flag is to say that the imagery comes from 'things the mind already knows.' A New York Times piece on his 2018 retrospective at the Broad Museum in Los Angeles describes Johns' style as one that 'claim public symbols for the realm of inwardness and private experience.' Why the flag? Johns is notoriously tight-lipped when it comes to the interpretation of his work. Among Johns' favorite subjects, the American flag.

Some suggest that his younger work pays homage to this school while also nodding to the emergent pop art scene - he pulls off a curious, thought-provoking blend of the quotidian and authentic gestural self-expression. Johns' early artistic rise coincided with the waning of the 'ab ex' movement. Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko were some of the more notable artists creating 'cathedrals … out of their own feelings.' Johns, one could argue, took this concept and turned it on its head with his own unique style. A Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient, the painter came of age around the time abstract expressionism had taken hold in the New York art world. Both the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and the Philadelphia Museum of Art have collaborated to present the 91-year-old artist's most comprehensive exhibit yet, 'Mind/Mirror.' Jasper Johns' work will be on display in two of the country's most famous art museums concurrently, through Feb. Through repetition and re-contextualization, Johns rejuvenates his work and refocuses our attention.Marlowe is a freelance writer, essayist, former English professor and LGBTQ+ activist who splits her time between Rochester, NY and Baltimore, MD.

The target later became a circular smear of paint-a blurred visual memory of gesture and speed. For example, his early target alluded to the pattern that draws the eye to its center.

Throughout his career, Johns has recast his flags, targets, and other borrowed subjects, and in the process he has transformed both the images and their potential meaning. He has also adapted imagery from many other artists, including Pablo Picasso, René Magritte, Marcel Duchamp, Edvard Munch, and Leonardo da Vinci.ĭrawn from the Museum’s extensive holdings of the artist’s work, Jasper Johns includes both original works along with prints. Born in 1930, he grew up in Allendale, the Columbia area, and Sumter he attended the University of South Carolina for three semesters before moving to New York to pursue his career in art.Īs a young artist, Johns narrowed his subjects to commonplace objects, “things the mind already knows,” but in later years he introduced more personal images of objects he has collected, including his father’s watch and a family photograph, as well as a shadow of himself. While his reputation is international, Johns has deep roots in South Carolina. His work bridges the immediate post-World War II modernist trends of Surrealism and Abstract Expressionism with subsequent movements of the 1960s, including Pop art, Minimalism, and Conceptual art. Jasper Johns is the world’s most critically acclaimed living artist.

Jasper johns