Cy Twombly~AMERICAN DRAFTSMAN, PAINTER, AND SCULPTOR

[Linda M.]

Born: April 25, 1928 - Lexington, Virginia

Died: July 5, 2011 - Rome, Italy

Movements and Styles: 

Abstract Expressionism

Although at first glance the graffiti-like scribbles and scratches of Cy Twombly's work might resemble art made by a naughty child of Jackson Pollock, it is nothing of the kind: it is the work of an erudite, sophisticated, and emotional painter. Whereas the work of Pollock and the Abstract Expressionists emerged in 1940s New York, where their existential inner dramas were enacted against the acutely felt backdrop of World War II, Twombly's work was part of the next generation, emerging during the 1950s in Europe - a Europe that was trying to forget and rebuild. Twombly, based for the most part in Rome, thus focused on his immediate surroundings, responding to the history and beauty he found there, combining aspects of both traditional European sources and the new American painting.

• Much of Twombly's work is a direct reflection of, response to, and re-working of the ancient Greco-Roman past that surrounded him in his chosen home in Rome. Inspirations came from Greek and Roman mythology, history, and places, French Neoclassicism, and contemporary graffiti on ancient local walls. Twombly was able to balance the seemingly static history of the past with his own sensual and emotional responses to it.
• In both the content and process of his art, Twombly was interested in the layering of time and history, of painting and drawing, and of various meanings and associations. His art situates itself in the context of the history of Western civilization, as well as the process-oriented aspects of Abstract Expressionism.
• Writing and language also served as major conceptual foundations for Twombly's mostly abstract art. In addition to the written word - in the form of poems, myths, and histories - he also focused on the process of writing, both by sketching unidentifiable doodles and splotches or words directly onto the canvas and by creating line-based compositions, often inspired by handwriting. Through these methods, he was often able to suggest subtle narratives that lay beneath the surfaces of his paintings
• 

Edwin Parker Twombly, Jr. was born in Lexington, Virginia in 1928. Like his father, who briefly pitched for the Chicago White Sox, Twombly was known as Cy, after Cy Young. His father later became a coach and athletic director at Washington and Lee University. Twombly's parents were from the Northeast, so he made frequent trips to Massachusetts and Maine, but the South, with its sense of history and autonomy, ultimately became an integral aspect of his identity. As a young boy, Twombly ordered and worked on art kits he ordered from the Sears Roebuck catalog. His parents encouraged his interest in art, and at twelve years old he started studying with the Spanish modern painter Pierre Daura.

Here is a link to see his art progresson:

Cy Twombly Paintings, Bio, Ideas | TheArtStory

1954

Untitled

While in the army, Twombly modified the Surrealist technique of automatic drawing by creating compositions in the dark - after lights out. These "blind" drawings resulted in the kind of elongated, distorted forms and curves that we see in this work. Biomorphic imagery is also apparent in the figurative scrawls giving way to more non-figurative scribbles and markings.

Colored pencil - Collection Cy Twombly Foundation

Part 2 will be his written works.  I'm still trying to find more information.

Cy Twombly Paintings, Bio, Ideas | TheArtStory

[Linda M.]

1962

Leda and the Swan

Leda and the Swan (the title is written in the lower right corner), one of Twombly's most accomplished works, illustrates his career-long attraction to the stories, literature, and events of classical antiquity, an interest that expanded further after he moved to Rome in 1957. The title refers to the Roman myth in which Jupiter, transformed into a swan, seduces Leda, who would later give birth to Helen of Troy. Rather than depict the conventional and erotic imagery of a graceful nude languidly entangled with a swan, Twombly combines diverse media, with the violent and forceful swirls, scratches, and zig-zags flying out in all directions suggesting the presence of Jupiter and the fleshy pinks and ovoid forms suggesting Leda and the eggs that were produced from the union. Amidst these colliding, graffiti-like elements, Twombly included recognizable hearts, a phallus/swan neck, and a window-like rectangle. This "window" provides a stabilizing effect on this otherwise explosive painting, but also amplifies content in its witty paradox of being part of graffiti on a flat wall vs. a window that might offer passage through the flatness to the world of the painting (and the myth of the title) or in the opposite direction to the real world outside. The work as a whole reconciles themes of male/female, destructive/creative, and earthly/divine. As in much of his work, Twombly transformed an ancient myth by becoming Jupiter himself: ravaging the canvas and producing beauty. As Roberta Smith has commented, "the crux of his achievement was not so much to overturn [Abstract Expressionism]," ... but to connect Abstract Expressionism to other forms of culture."

Oil paint, lead pencil, wax crayon on canvas. 75 x 78 3/4 in. - The Museum of Modern Art, New York

[Carmen Elsa Irarragorri Wyland]

Well, that last one, really made me laugh. So much love involved, so many hearts!

[Linda M.]

I didn't post this because I necessarily liked him.  It amazed me he sold these.  It was interesting abstract.  I think I'll dig out my daughters' kindergarten pictures.  lol

[MARGARIDA MARIA MADRUGA]

Forgive my ignorance, but I see nothing in these scribbles.

[Linda M.]

If you are ignorant, then so am I.  lolol  I saw nothing too.  It amazed me this man sold those for thousands.  

[MARGARIDA MARIA MADRUGA]

Exactly, Linda. This type of art yields a lot to its creators.

[Linda M.]

It's like that old story, the Emperor's New Clothes"  People buy the paintings, then don't want to admit it's, well, crap, so here comes the next person, and the next...

[Carmen Elsa Irarragorri Wyland]

What a great comparison, Linda!

I won't have any of those horror stuff in my house, but then, I am a painter, myself, and I only have what I like in it!

[Linda M.]

Gary loves the horror stuff, it's in our bedroom...only he doesn't sleep there anymore, he's in the den, and I'm stuck with the horror stuff.  I keep trying to slowly relocate it.