Featured Artist for December 1999

Featured GiveAway by Joseph R Hanson 1997.009 16" x 16" - 1997 Oil On Woodpanel Valued at $900

Randy Waters Gold Beach, Oregon

With its rich colors and lush texture, 1997.009 forms dimension so the viewer steps into the work directly. Joseph started working on it while he was working on large compositions. He wanted 1997.009 to have the same level of impact, energy and exitement as he had going on in the larger painting. To contain so much energy and expression in a small square proved to be challenging and what resulted is one of Joseph's favorite pieces.


MEET THE ARTIST

Featured Artist Joseph Hanson

Joseph Hanson Joseph Hanson was born on April 21, 1971, in Ames, Iowa. He grew up in neighboring Boone and began drawing around age 6 when a family friend taught him how to draw a horse. He also recalls drawing pictures of hot rods in 2nd grade and selling them to other students for 10 cents. He was not aware of any family roots in the arts until he met his paternal Grandfather for the first time. He hadn't known him or any one on his father's side of the family for the first twenty years of his life. His grandfather mentioned several relatives involved in art, graphic arts, and others involved in vocations with regard to artistry. Art was more of a hobby for Joseph through High School and he didn't think seriously about it as a career until freshman year of college.

Joseph tries to keep a somewhat normal schedule, but once a body of work gets started, he may keep it going all day, maybe even into wee hours of the morning. He's also taken days off from painting and comes back to the painting with a fresh perspective. He uses his hands, brushes, tubes, knives, rags, sponges, and/or squeegees to apply the paint to the panels. He's currently working almost exclusively in oil on birch wood panels. He started using the wood panels in January of 1997 and still finds the combination of the smooth wood and lucid oil paint conducive to attaining results he feels are important to his work. For Joseph, the panel lends itself to more versatility than canvas and gesso.

He grew up interested in carpentry and woodwork and has a great appreciation for the diverse personalities that each panel of wood presents. The union of high quality oil paints and the birch wood ensures longevity beyond that of other mediums. He plans on experimenting with reliefs and sculpture before the turn of the century.

Joseph works on his art full time and if he's not painting, he's pursuing artistic endeavors. He does not push any political buttons or make grandiose statements in his art. What he does is strive for a pure aesthetic of color, balance, shape, space, texture, line, and pure emotion. He lets go of everything cognitive when he paints and transcends into a subconscious state when he's painting. He doesn't think "if I put blue here it will make some one think of water,” it’s more like "some blue here would balance out the orange over here or a line here will create tension over there...” or “I'm feeling red today, give me red, red, red." So off to the store he’ll load up on every hue and variation of red he can get his hands on. Then he just lets loose, stops after an hour or two, and steps back to look at where he's at to see what other ways he could go with the painting. When the right idea grabs him whether it's an hour, a day or three months later - he goes with it until he reaches another interesting place in the painting. He'll do this over and over until the piece is resolved in emotions released from plain elements such as color and shape.

Profound Statements, 1999, Hand Pulled Lithograph 30" x 40", $300 Edition: 100

Joseph wants to evoke in people an experience with his art, a sense of "wow" or a sense of peace or a sense of tension. He wants his work to stimulate the viewer, to make them really feel. He earned his Bachelor Fine Arts degree with an emphasis on Drawing, Painting, and Printmaking from Iowa State University.

Joseph moved to Los Angeles to elude the cold and ever changing climate of the Midwest. Shortly after, he began work on a large project doing all of the artwork for Brix Restaurant in West Des Moines, Iowa. The project entailed over thirty original works for the five star restaurant's permanent collection. Recently Joseph has been featured in the spring 1998 edition of Visions Magazine and as well as the October 1997 issue of Iowa Architecture.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Joseph doesn't actually feel he chose painting as a career as much as it chose him. Paul Jenkins' paintings were the first he experienced that really affected him. After discovering his work, he searched feverishly for other artists who shared his palette and philosophy. He learned more about Jackson Pollock and the abstract expressionist movement. At the time, he was pursuing a minor in philosophy at Iowa State University and the combination of the unbridled expression and the intriguing thought process of abstract expressionism consumed his interests. He’s been addicted to experimenting and expressing himself through paint and color ever since. Other artists influential in his development include: Gerhard Richter, Robert Motherwell, Jasper Johns, Jules Olitski, Robert Rauschenburg, Helen Frankenthaler, Richard Diebenkorn, and Mark Rothko.

1997.007, 1997 Oil on Woodpanel 48" x 72" $6100

Around this same time Joseph became increasingly interested in philosophy, which became the foundation for his painting. Writing like John Dewey's “Art as Experience,” Wassily Kandinsky's “Concerning the Spiritual in Art,” and selected essays by Carl Jung also served as essential building blocks. His paintings take shape in their making: before starting he has no idea what a given painting will look like upon completion. He begins the process by first selecting the size of panel and its format; horizontal or vertical, single panel or triptych, canvas or wood panel, then choosing the color scheme and embarking on non-stop work until the painting “becomes interesting.” He then reflects and repeats the process over and over until reaching a point of resolution. Knowing when to release, restrain and stop becomes the essential disciplines in the execution of his work. The last few steps of the process are long periods of reflection in which he determine whether or not the painting is balanced, resolved and most importantly if it is effective.

Stone Improvisation #1, 1999 Stone Lithograph 10 7/8" x 12 3/4", $126.00 edition: 25

Joseph's interests include golf, photography, computers, digital art, running, triathlons, basketball, pop culture, culture, literature, philosophy, psychology, camping, hiking, mountain biking, and traveling. All these interests relate in the sense of loving and embracing life and all that it has to give, the experiences and the lessons they offer. He feels all of his experiences contribute to his art in one way or another. Joseph loves spending with his family and staying fit since he's running in the LA Marathon in 2000. He dislikes the phrase “I can’t…,” pessimistic attitudes, incompetence, half heartedness, and whining.

Color can be very powerful if one stops looking for faces or objects in a painting. His concerns revolve around honesty in his work, expressing from within, and sharing his work with the world in general, regardless of people’s backgrounds. Whether or not someone is educated in the arts, has a trust fund, owns a gas station, picks up trash, owns a gallery, or is a house parent, aren’t important to him. What he values is problem solving in a visual and compositional way while expressing himself and his feelings in a non-verbal way. His need to create and explore, to work with color gives him the incentive to keep working.He paints to fulfill something inside and hopes to get that sense of "wow" from anyone who happens to see the painting and feels moved by it.

1997.010, 1997 Oil on Woodpanel 48" x 72" $6,500

PARTIAL LIST OF EXHIBITS:

1998: The Loft, BGH Gallery #2 at Bergamont Station Santa Monica, CA
1998: Chozen Gallery at 473 N. Palm Canyon Dr. Palm Springs, CA Santa Monica Bank on Wilshire, Westwood Village Los Angeles, CA
1997: Sumitomo Building at 800 Wilshire Downtown Los Angeles, CA Higher Ground Fine Art Gallery at 11740 Wilshire West Los Angeles
1997: LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) Second Annual Mar Vista Art Walk Co-host Venice, CA Group shows
1995: Higher Ground Fine Art Gallery at 410 ˝ Douglas Ames, IA
1994: The First Edition on Main St. Ames, IA

Contact the Artist

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ARTIST STATEMENT

We need to learn by teaching ourselves and others. We need to learn by being open to being taught by other people and other things. Furthermore, taking what we have learned, being open minded with it and then taking the time and energy to formulate our own thoughts and beliefs from all that we perceive. The more depth there is in what we choose to focus our energies on, the more potential for growth. An increase in personal growth leads to greater depth in the individual. To have depth is to give back to the time and space we occupy. It is our rent which is long past due. ~ Joseph Hanson