visual art
The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, filmmaking, design, crafts and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as performing arts, conceptual art, and textile arts ...
movement that arose in the
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
area in the late 1960s. It is a populist art movement with its cultural roots in
underground comix
Underground comix are small press or self-published comic books that are often socially relevant or satirical in nature. They differ from mainstream comics in depicting content forbidden to mainstream publications by the Comics Code Authority ...
graffiti
Graffiti (plural; singular ''graffiti'' or ''graffito'', the latter rarely used except in archeology) is art that is written, painted or drawn on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from s ...
, and hot-rod cultures of the street. It is also often known by the name pop surrealism. Lowbrow art often has a sense of humor – sometimes the humor is gleeful, impish, or a sarcastic comment.
Most lowbrow artworks are
painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and a ...
s, but there are also
toy
A toy or plaything is an object that is used primarily to provide entertainment. Simple examples include toy blocks, board games, and dolls. Toys are often designed for use by children, although many are designed specifically for adults and pet ...
s,
digital art
Digital art refers to any artistic work or practice that uses digital technology as part of the creative or presentation process, or more specifically computational art that uses and engages with digital media.
Since the 1960s, various name ...
, and
sculpture
Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable ...
.
History
Some of the first artists to create what came to be known as lowbrow art were underground cartoonists like Robert Williams and Gary Panter. Barry McGee, Margaret Killgalen, Dan "Plasma" Rauch and Camilla Elke were amongst the first to pioneer Lowbrow as a street art, zine, fashion, graffiti, and counter culture movement. The purpose of the lowbrow movement was to take an unorthodox approach to art and to completely defy its "rules". This resulted in pushback from significant individuals and organizations in the art industry. Early shows were in alternative galleries in New York and Los Angeles such as Psychedelic Solutions Gallery in
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...
La Luz de Jesus
La Luz de Jesus Gallery is a commercial art gallery located in Los Angeles, California. It is closely associated with the Lowbrow Art Movement, Kustom Kulture, and pop surrealism.
History
La Luz de Jesus Gallery was established in 1986 in Lo ...
run by Billy Shire and 01 gallery in Hollywood, run by John Pochna. The movement steadily grew from its beginning, with hundreds of artists adopting this style. As the number of artists grew, so did the number of galleries showing lowbrow. In 1992 Greg Escalante helped orchestrate the first formal gallery exhibition to take lowbrow art seriously; painter Anthony Ausgang's solo show "Looney Virtues” at the Julie Rico Gallery in
Santa Monica
Santa Monica (; Spanish: ''Santa Mónica'') is a city in Los Angeles County, situated along Santa Monica Bay on California's South Coast. Santa Monica's 2020 U.S. Census population was 93,076. Santa Monica is a popular resort town, owing to i ...
. The Bess Cutler Gallery also went on to show important artists and helped expand the kind of art that was classified as lowbrow. The lowbrow magazine '' Juxtapoz'', launched in 1994 by Robert Williams, Greg Escalante, and
Eric Swenson
Eric Leon Swenson (August 4, 1946 – June 20, 2011) was an American skateboard designer and magazine publisher.
Born in San Francisco, Swenson was the chief skateboard designer for the Independent Truck Company, which he co-founded with skateboa ...
, has been a mainstay of writing on lowbrow art and has helped shape and expand the movement.
Etymology
In an article in the February 2006 issue of his magazine ''Juxtapoz'', Robert Williams took credit for originating the term "lowbrow art". He stated that in 1979 Gilbert Shelton of the publisher
Rip Off Press
Rip Off Press Inc. is a comic book mail order retailer and distributor, better known as the former publisher of adult-themed series like '' The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers'' and ''Rip Off Comix'', as well as many other seminal publications from ...
decided to produce a book featuring Willams' paintings. Williams said he decided to give the book the self-deprecating title ''The Lowbrow Art of Robt. Williams'', since no authorized art institution would recognize his type of art. "Lowbrow" was thus used by Williams in opposition to "
highbrow
Used colloquially as a noun or adjective, "highbrow" is synonymous with intellectual; as an adjective, it also means elite, and generally carries a connotation of high culture. The term, first recorded in 1875, draws its metonymy from the pseudo ...
". He said the name then stuck, even though he feels it is inappropriate. Williams refers to the movement as "cartoon-tainted abstract surrealism." Lately, Williams has begun referring to his own work as "Conceptual Realism".
* Anthony Ausgang
*
Mark Ryden
Mark Ryden (born January 20, 1963) is an American painter who is considered to be part of the Lowbrow (or Pop Surrealist) art movement.Ken Johnson"Mark Ryden: ‘The Gay 90s: Old Tyme Art Show" ''The New York Times'', May 6, 2010. Retrieved 2013 ...
Corrie Erickson Corrie may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* nickname of '' Coronation Street'', a long-running British television soap opera
** ''Corrie!'', a play written to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of ''Coronation Street'' in 2010
* The Corries, a Scott ...
*
Camille Rose Garcia
Camille Rose Garcia (born November 18, 1970) is a California-based lowbrow/pop surrealism artist. She produces paintings in a gothic, "creepy" cartoon style. She cites as influences Walt Disney and Philip K. Dick.
Early life and education
Garc ...
Amy Sol
Amy Sol (born 1981) is an American artist of Korean ancestry, who lives in Las Vegas, Nevada. She is a member in good standing of a loose knit community of artists practicing Lowbrow (art movement), Pop Surreal, Lowbrow (art movement), Lowbrow, or ...
*
Kenny Scharf
Kenny Scharf (born November 23, 1958) is an American painter known for his participation in New York City's interdisciplinary East Village art scene during the 1980s, alongside Jean-Michel Basquiat and Keith Haring. Scharf's do-it-yourself pract ...
Marion Peck
Marion Peck (born October 3, 1963 in Manila, the Philippines) is a pop surrealism, pop surrealist painter based in the United States.
Biography
Marion Peck was born on October 3, 1963 in Manila, the Philippines, while her family was on a trip a ...
*
Tara McPherson
Tara McPherson (born April 7, 1976, in San Francisco, California) is an American artist based in New York. McPherson creates paintings, murals, poster art, and designer toys, within the New Contemporary Art movement.
Biography
Tara McPherson s ...
*
Sunny Buick
Sunny Buick (née Gypsy Sunshine Buick, August 4, 1970, Nakusp, British Columbia, Canada) is a French-American painter who participated in the Lowbrow Pop Surrealism movement of California, USA from 1996 to 2003. Buick currently lives and wor ...
* Jason Limón
* Victor Castillo
* Miss Van
* Joe Vaux
* Brandi Milne
* Lola Gil
* Martin Wittfooth
* Hannah Yata
* Gregory Jacobsen
* Naoto Hattori
* Dan Quintana
* Gregory Hergert
* Renee French
* Travis Lampe
* Mark Rogers
* Gary Baseman
* Mark Bryan
Books
There are several books which offer overview histories of lowbrow, including the following:
*
* A collection of
La Luz de Jesus Gallery
La Luz de Jesus Gallery is a commercial art gallery located in Los Angeles, California. It is closely associated with the Lowbrow Art Movement, Kustom Kulture, and pop surrealism.
History
La Luz de Jesus Gallery was established in 1986 in Lo ...
in Hollywood, CA that has carried Lowbrow art for 25 years.
*
*
*
*
Tokion
''Tokion'' was a Japanese-based magazine covering art, fashion, music and film first published in Japan in 1996, followed by United States, UK, and Hong Kong editions. The magazine's makers also produced the annual Creativity Now Conference, a wee ...
'' is a magazine with both Japanese and US editions.
*''Hi-Fructose''
*Beautiful Bizarre Magazine
*Hey Magazine
See also
*
Chicago Imagists The Chicago Imagists are a group of representational artists associated with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago who exhibited at the Hyde Park Art Center in the late 1960s.
Their work was known for grotesquerie, Surrealism and complete ind ...
*
Decadent movement
The Decadent movement (Fr. ''décadence'', “decay”) was a late-19th-century artistic and literary movement, centered in Western Europe, that followed an aesthetic ideology of excess and artificiality.
The Decadent movement first flourishe ...
*
Dieselpunk
Dieselpunk is a retrofuturistic subgenre of science fiction similar to steampunk or cyberpunk that combines the aesthetics of the diesel-based technology of the interwar period through to the 1950s with retro-futuristic technology and postmode ...
*
Kitsch
Kitsch ( ; loanword from German) is a term applied to art and design that is perceived as naïve imitation, overly-eccentric, gratuitous, or of banal taste.
The avant-garde opposed kitsch as melodramatic and superficial affiliation wi ...
Massurrealism
Massurrealism is a portmanteau word coined in 1992 by American artist James Seehafer, who described a trend among some postmodern artists that mix the aesthetic styles and themes of surrealism and mass media—including pop art.Adam"massurr ...
*
Middlebrow
The term middlebrow describes easily accessible art, usually literature, and the people who use the arts to acquire culture and "class" (social prestige). First used in the British satire magazine '' Punch'' in 1925, the term ''middlebrow'' is the ...
Outsider art
Outsider art is art made by self-taught or supposedly naïve artists with typically little or no contact with the conventions of the art worlds. In many cases, their work is discovered only after their deaths. Often, outsider art illustrate ...
*
Stuckism
Stuckism () is an international art movement founded in 1999 by Billy Childish and Charles Thomson to promote figurative painting as opposed to conceptual art.Superflat
* Tiki culture
*
Underground art
Underground art is any form of art that operates outside of conventional norms in the art world, part of underground culture. This can include essentially any genre of art that is not popular in the art world, including visionary art and street ...
References
Citations
Sources
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* Magliozzi, Ron. "Tim Burton: Exercising the Imagination." ''Tim Burton''. The Museum of Modern Art, 2009, pp. 9-15.
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