| Jerome Witkin | ||
| Birth Date: September 13, 1939 |
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Artist Gallery |
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| Jerome Witkin was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1939. He attended the High School of Music and Art in New York City and at fifteen he was awarded a scholarship to attend the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Skowhegan, Maine.
Witkin was trained in the Abstract-Expressionist style, dominate in the 1950s, an influence still apparent both in the heroic size of his pictures and in their restless, kinetic style. He explores socially relevant themes and his work also refers to personal matters, sometimes representing situations from what he admits was a difficult and painful childhood.
Ralphael Soyer wrote the following about Witkin and his style: “Jerome Witkin paints larger than life, under relentless electric light, having discovered after much experimentation with lighting, that in this way he can expose the naked reality of his subject to the fullest extent. Unlike other painters of this type, however, Witkin’s work is less harsh, more subjective, and more poetic, more involved with the content of what he is painting. It is emotional, even impetuous. His paintings fairly crackle with life, compositions of epic character…Now he is looking forward to painting a picture of Rembrandt in his studio, and later a painting about George de la Tour. What commendable reverence for old masters”.
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