Claire Falkenstein
Encyclopedia
Claire Falkenstein (July 22, 1908 – October 23, 1997) was an American sculptor, painter, printmaker, jewelry designer, and teacher, most renowned for her often large-scale abstract metal and glass public sculptures.
. Her first twelve years were spent living amid the natural beauty of the Oregon coast; her mature works reflect this organic influence. Her father managed a lumber mill and her mother provided an environment conducive to artistic expression. Claire attended high school in the Oakland
–Berkeley, California
area after her family moved there.
She attended the University of California at Berkeley
without initially intending to study art. However, by her junior year it became clear to her that art was her passion. She graduated in 1930 with a major in art and minors in anthropology and philosophy. She had her first one-woman exhibition, at a San Francisco gallery, even before graduation. Her art education continued in the early 1930s at Mills College
, where she took a master class
with Alexander Archipenko
, and met Laszlo Moholy-Nagy
and György Kepes
.
, as well as ideas that functional considerations do not detract from a work's aesthetic appeal, and that she was free to experiment with a wide variety of new techniques and materials.
She taught art classes at various Bay Area locations, such as UC Berkeley Extension, Mills College, and the California Labor School. She also taught at the innovative California School of Fine Arts, alongside abstract expressionists
such as Clyfford Still
, who would become a close friend and artistic influence, and Richard Diebenkorn
. In 1934, she created an abstract fresco
at Oakland
's Piedmont High School. This was part of the Federal Art Project
, which strongly preferred paintings depicting American scenes, but some abstracts such as this work by Falkenstein were tolerated. During the 1930s she created sculptures from clay ribbons formed into Möbius strip
s, woven together. These were some of the earliest American nonobjective sculptures.
She was married for twenty-two years to Irish-American trial lawyer Richard McCarthy, whom she had known in high school; they were divorced because he didn't join her in her desire to live in Paris.
, Alberto Giacometti
, Sam Francis
and Paul Jenkins, as well as art connoisseur Michel Tapié
who acted as a sort of mentor and promoter for the Americans.
In a 1995 interview, she said that "Paris was a remarkable experience, because the French allowed a kind of individual action. They have the quality of centuries of ... culture and of art and it sort of spills over." She explored what she referred to as "topology", a connection between matter and space, incorporating a concept of the continuous void in nature. She became associated with the free-form abstractions of L'Art Informel
.
Out of economic necessity, Falkenstein inventively used inexpensive nontraditional materials for her artwork, including wooden logs, stovepipe wire, and lead bars. She used stovepipe wire, in particular, in innovative ways, and continued to do so even after she was able to afford other materials. The large, airy forms constructed of this material became part of her famous style.
Rather than sculpture, she preferred the use of the word structure to refer to her work. She applied the term to her paintings and prints as well. A critic compared Falkenstein's work of the 1950s to "a Jackson Pollock in three dimensions". Some of her work has a structure which appears as if it could grow, infinitely expanding, similar to the way Pollock
's paintings may appear as if they could continue beyond the canvas.
One of her most well-known pieces is The New Gates of Paradise, constructed of metal webbing with chunks of glass. Located on the Grand Canal at the Guggenheim Museum
in Venice, Italy, it had been commissioned in 1960 by her friend Peggy Guggenheim
. The gates, each of which was 12 by 4 ft (3.7 by 1.2 ), marked the first time she created a never-ending screen with repeating modules attached in various directions, giving the impression that it could continue forever.
in Los Angeles. These 1969 pieces are considered by some to be her finest achievements. She said of the windows: "To my knowledge, they're the only abstract windows for a Catholic church." Among the other southern California venues featuring her works are Fresno
's Fulton Mall, South Coast Plaza
, the Department of Motor Vehicles in downtown Los Angeles, and various college campuses including California State University, Fullerton
(she described her sculpture there as "metallic joy – an activity of forces"), California State University, Dominguez Hills
, University of California, Los Angeles
, University of Southern California
, and California State University, Long Beach
.
The Long Beach Museum of Art
named its restaurant "Claire's at the Museum" in honor of Falkenstein. The artist created Structure and Flow, a fountain with twisting latticework, which was donated to the museum in 1972. This work of art, the restaurant's centerpiece, is another creation which many consider to be among her finest.
She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship
for Fine Arts in 1978. From about 1990 on, her work was concentrated on painting rather than sculpture. Falkenstein died at her Venice home on October 23, 1997 of stomach cancer
, at the age of 89. Over the course of her long career as an artist she had produced over 4,000 sculptures, paintings and drawings.
Early life and education
Claire Falkenstein was born on July 22, 1908, in Coos Bay, OregonCoos Bay, Oregon
Coos Bay is a city located in Coos County, Oregon, United States, where the Coos River enters Coos Bay on the Pacific Ocean. The city borders the city of North Bend, and together they are often referred to as one entity called either Coos Bay-North Bend or the Bay Area...
. Her first twelve years were spent living amid the natural beauty of the Oregon coast; her mature works reflect this organic influence. Her father managed a lumber mill and her mother provided an environment conducive to artistic expression. Claire attended high school in the Oakland
Oakland, California
Oakland is a major West Coast port city on San Francisco Bay in the U.S. state of California. It is the eighth-largest city in the state with a 2010 population of 390,724...
–Berkeley, California
Berkeley, California
Berkeley is a city on the east shore of the San Francisco Bay in Northern California, United States. Its neighbors to the south are the cities of Oakland and Emeryville. To the north is the city of Albany and the unincorporated community of Kensington...
area after her family moved there.
She attended the University of California at Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
without initially intending to study art. However, by her junior year it became clear to her that art was her passion. She graduated in 1930 with a major in art and minors in anthropology and philosophy. She had her first one-woman exhibition, at a San Francisco gallery, even before graduation. Her art education continued in the early 1930s at Mills College
Mills College
Mills College is an independent liberal arts women's college founded in 1852 that offers bachelor's degrees to women and graduate degrees and certificates to women and men. Located in Oakland, California, Mills was the first women's college west of the Rockies. The institution was initially founded...
, where she took a master class
Master class
A master class is a class given to students of a particular discipline by an expert of that discipline—usually music, but also painting, drama, or any of the arts....
with Alexander Archipenko
Alexander Archipenko
Alexander Porfyrovych Archipenko was a Ukrainian avant-garde artist, sculptor, and graphic artist.-Biography:...
, and met Laszlo Moholy-Nagy
László Moholy-Nagy
László Moholy-Nagy was a Hungarian painter and photographer as well as professor in the Bauhaus school. He was highly influenced by constructivism and a strong advocate of the integration of technology and industry into the arts.-Early life:...
and György Kepes
György Kepes
György Kepes was a Hungarian-born painter, designer, educator and art theorist. After emigrating to the U.S. in 1937, he taught design at the New Bauhaus in Chicago...
.
San Francisco
Falkenstein's experience with those artists reinforced her interest in abstractionAbstract art
Abstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an...
, as well as ideas that functional considerations do not detract from a work's aesthetic appeal, and that she was free to experiment with a wide variety of new techniques and materials.
She taught art classes at various Bay Area locations, such as UC Berkeley Extension, Mills College, and the California Labor School. She also taught at the innovative California School of Fine Arts, alongside abstract expressionists
Abstract expressionism
Abstract expressionism was an American post–World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve worldwide influence and put New York City at the center of the western art world, a role formerly filled by Paris...
such as Clyfford Still
Clyfford Still
Clyfford Still was an American painter, and one of the leading figures of Abstract Expressionism.-Biography:...
, who would become a close friend and artistic influence, and Richard Diebenkorn
Richard Diebenkorn
Richard Diebenkorn was a well-known 20th century American painter. His early work is associated with Abstract expressionism and the Bay Area Figurative Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. His later work were instrumental to his achievement of worldwide acclaim.-Biography:Richard Clifford Diebenkorn Jr...
. In 1934, she created an abstract fresco
Fresco
Fresco is any of several related mural painting types, executed on plaster on walls or ceilings. The word fresco comes from the Greek word affresca which derives from the Latin word for "fresh". Frescoes first developed in the ancient world and continued to be popular through the Renaissance...
at Oakland
Oakland, California
Oakland is a major West Coast port city on San Francisco Bay in the U.S. state of California. It is the eighth-largest city in the state with a 2010 population of 390,724...
's Piedmont High School. This was part of the Federal Art Project
Federal Art Project
The Federal Art Project was the visual arts arm of the Great Depression-era New Deal Works Progress Administration Federal One program in the United States. It operated from August 29, 1935, until June 30, 1943. Reputed to have created more than 200,000 separate works, FAP artists created...
, which strongly preferred paintings depicting American scenes, but some abstracts such as this work by Falkenstein were tolerated. During the 1930s she created sculptures from clay ribbons formed into Möbius strip
Möbius strip
The Möbius strip or Möbius band is a surface with only one side and only one boundary component. The Möbius strip has the mathematical property of being non-orientable. It can be realized as a ruled surface...
s, woven together. These were some of the earliest American nonobjective sculptures.
She was married for twenty-two years to Irish-American trial lawyer Richard McCarthy, whom she had known in high school; they were divorced because he didn't join her in her desire to live in Paris.
Paris
Falkenstein did move to Paris in 1950 and remained for thirteen years, maintaining a studio on the Left Bank. In Paris she met many artists, including Jean ArpJean Arp
Jean Arp / Hans Arp was a German-French, or Alsatian, sculptor, painter, poet and abstract artist in other media such as torn and pasted paper....
, Alberto Giacometti
Alberto Giacometti
Alberto Giacometti was a Swiss sculptor, painter, draughtsman, and printmaker.Alberto Giacometti was born in the canton Graubünden's southerly alpine valley Val Bregaglia and came from an artistic background; his father, Giovanni, was a well-known post-Impressionist painter...
, Sam Francis
Sam Francis
Samuel Lewis Francis was an American painter and printmaker.-Early life:...
and Paul Jenkins, as well as art connoisseur Michel Tapié
Michel Tapié
Michel Tapié was an internationally active French critic, curator, and collector of art. He was an early and influential theorist and practitioner of "tachisme", which is generally regarded as the European equivalent of abstract expressionism...
who acted as a sort of mentor and promoter for the Americans.
In a 1995 interview, she said that "Paris was a remarkable experience, because the French allowed a kind of individual action. They have the quality of centuries of ... culture and of art and it sort of spills over." She explored what she referred to as "topology", a connection between matter and space, incorporating a concept of the continuous void in nature. She became associated with the free-form abstractions of L'Art Informel
Tachisme
Tachisme is a French style of abstract painting popular in the 1940s and 1950s. It is often considered to be the European equivalent to abstract expressionism...
.
Out of economic necessity, Falkenstein inventively used inexpensive nontraditional materials for her artwork, including wooden logs, stovepipe wire, and lead bars. She used stovepipe wire, in particular, in innovative ways, and continued to do so even after she was able to afford other materials. The large, airy forms constructed of this material became part of her famous style.
Rather than sculpture, she preferred the use of the word structure to refer to her work. She applied the term to her paintings and prints as well. A critic compared Falkenstein's work of the 1950s to "a Jackson Pollock in three dimensions". Some of her work has a structure which appears as if it could grow, infinitely expanding, similar to the way Pollock
Jackson Pollock
Paul Jackson Pollock , known as Jackson Pollock, was an influential American painter and a major figure in the abstract expressionist movement. During his lifetime, Pollock enjoyed considerable fame and notoriety. He was regarded as a mostly reclusive artist. He had a volatile personality, and...
's paintings may appear as if they could continue beyond the canvas.
One of her most well-known pieces is The New Gates of Paradise, constructed of metal webbing with chunks of glass. Located on the Grand Canal at the Guggenheim Museum
Peggy Guggenheim Collection
The Peggy Guggenheim Collection is an art museum on the Grand Canal in Venice, Italy. It is one of several museums of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation....
in Venice, Italy, it had been commissioned in 1960 by her friend Peggy Guggenheim
Peggy Guggenheim
Marguerite "Peggy" Guggenheim was an American art collector. Born to a wealthy New York City family, she was the daughter of Benjamin Guggenheim, who went down with the Titanic in 1912 and the niece of Solomon R. Guggenheim, who would establish the Solomon R...
. The gates, each of which was 12 by 4 ft (3.7 by 1.2 ), marked the first time she created a never-ending screen with repeating modules attached in various directions, giving the impression that it could continue forever.
Los Angeles
In 1963, Falkenstein moved to the Venice district of Los Angeles, building an oceanfront home/studio. Falkenstein received many high-profile commissions for large public art pieces, including sculptures, fountains, and screens. She created the doors, gates, and stained-glass windows for St. Basil Catholic ChurchSt. Basil Catholic Church
St. Basil Catholic Church is a Roman Catholic church and parish in the Los Angeles Archdiocese, Our Lady of the Angels Pastoral Region. The church is located at 3611 Wilshire Boulevard in the Wilshire district of Los Angeles, California. The church was built from 1967-1969 and dedicated in 1969...
in Los Angeles. These 1969 pieces are considered by some to be her finest achievements. She said of the windows: "To my knowledge, they're the only abstract windows for a Catholic church." Among the other southern California venues featuring her works are Fresno
Fresno
Fresno is the fifth largest city in California.Fresno may also refer to:-Places:Colombia* Fresno, TolimaSpain* Fresno, a ghost village in Nidáliga, Valle de Sedano, Burgos* Aldea del Fresno, Madrid* Fresno de la Vega, Ribera del Esla, León...
's Fulton Mall, South Coast Plaza
South Coast Plaza
South Coast Plaza is an upscale-luxury shopping center in Costa Mesa, California, USA, in Orange County. The largest mall in California, its sales of over 1.5 billion are highest in the United States...
, the Department of Motor Vehicles in downtown Los Angeles, and various college campuses including California State University, Fullerton
California State University, Fullerton
California State University, Fullerton is a public university located in Fullerton, California. It is the largest institution in the CSU System by enrollment, it offers long-distance education and adult-degree programs...
(she described her sculpture there as "metallic joy – an activity of forces"), California State University, Dominguez Hills
California State University, Dominguez Hills
California State University, Dominguez Hills is a public university located in the South Bay region of Los Angeles County and was founded in 1960...
, University of California, Los Angeles
University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...
, University of Southern California
University of Southern California
The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...
, and California State University, Long Beach
California State University, Long Beach
California State University, Long Beach is the second largest campus of the California State University system and the third largest university in the state of California by enrollment...
.
The Long Beach Museum of Art
Long Beach Museum of Art
The Long Beach Museum of Art is a museum located on Ocean Boulevard in the Bluff Park neighborhood of Long Beach, California. The museum occupies the historic 1912 Elizabeth Milbank Anderson house and carriage house and a new two-story pavilion, and includes oceanfront gardens. The museum is open...
named its restaurant "Claire's at the Museum" in honor of Falkenstein. The artist created Structure and Flow, a fountain with twisting latticework, which was donated to the museum in 1972. This work of art, the restaurant's centerpiece, is another creation which many consider to be among her finest.
She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowships are American grants that have been awarded annually since 1925 by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts." Each year, the foundation makes...
for Fine Arts in 1978. From about 1990 on, her work was concentrated on painting rather than sculpture. Falkenstein died at her Venice home on October 23, 1997 of stomach cancer
Stomach cancer
Gastric cancer, commonly referred to as stomach cancer, can develop in any part of the stomach and may spread throughout the stomach and to other organs; particularly the esophagus, lungs, lymph nodes, and the liver...
, at the age of 89. Over the course of her long career as an artist she had produced over 4,000 sculptures, paintings and drawings.
External links
- Claire Falkenstein, Collections Search Center, Smithsonian InstitutionSmithsonian InstitutionThe Smithsonian Institution is an educational and research institute and associated museum complex, administered and funded by the government of the United States and by funds from its endowment, contributions, and profits from its retail operations, concessions, licensing activities, and magazines...