Max Arthur Cohn (1903–1998) was an American artist, born in England. His family emigrated to the United States when he was two years old. Cohn was one of the artists employed by the New Deal's

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...

(WPA) during the Great Depression, painting for the Easel Project and the

Public Works of Art Project The Public Works of Art Project (PWAP) was a New Deal program designed to employ artists that operated from 1933 to 1934. The program was headed by Edward Bruce, under the United States Treasury Department with funding from the Civil Works Admin ...

. At this period he took up silk screening, a technique he had learned in a

commercial art Commercial art is the art of creative services, referring to art created for commercial purposes, primarily advertising. Commercial art uses a variety of platforms (magazines, websites, apps, television, etc.) for viewers with the intent of prom ...

studio in 1920. In 1940, Cohn, Anthony Velonis,

Hyman Warsager Hyman J. Warsager (1909–1974) was an American artist known for his printmaking. Biography Warsager was born in 1909 in New York City. He attended the Pratt Institute, the Grand Central School of Art, and the American Artists School. He worked ...

and other artists co-founded the

National Serigraph Society The National Serigraph Society was founded in 1940 by a group of artists involved in the WPA Federal Art Project, including Anthony Velonis, Max Arthur Cohn, and Hyman Warsager. The creation of the society coincided with the rise of serigraphs ...

Andy Warhol's introduction to Silkscreen Printing

Cohn is credited with introducing a young

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the Art movement, visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore th ...

to silkscreen techniques. A biography of Warhol on Sotheby's site states: "Warhol had a successful start in NYC as an illustrator in advertising, and he was commissioned to draw shoes for Glamour magazine in the 1940s. A few exhibitions in the 1950s brought him attention and notoriety, and Max Arthur Cohn taught him how to create silkscreens in the 1960s, leading to a fertile period of artistic output and some of Warhol’s most famous works such as Campbell’s Soup Cans and

Marilyn Diptych The ''Marilyn Diptych'' (1962) is a silkscreen painting by American pop artist Andy Warhol depicting Marilyn Monroe. The monumental work is one of the artist's most noted of the movie star. The painting consists of 50 images. Each image of t ...

. Warhol’s Factory attracted bohemians, artists, models and socialites, all contributing to shaping NYC’s culture as a mecca for creative souls."

Zimmerli Art Museum Exhibit, 2018

An article in Art Daily in 2018 discussed an exhibit at the Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutger University titled ''Serigraphy: The Rise of Screenprinting in America'' that included a dramatic print by Cohn: "Rainy Day (circa 1940) by Max Arthur Cohn contrasts many of the works in the show. Unlike the other vibrant and dynamic prints, it captures the glistening gloom of a drenched city street at night, with a few lonely city dwellers attempting to escape the elements. But this unassuming artist went on to own a graphic arts business in Manhattan, where he is said to have taught silkscreen techniques to a young man named Andy Warhol in the 1950s."

Works

Cohn's works are in MoMa New York, the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, the Art Institute of Chicago, the

Whitney Museum of American Art The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–194 ...

, the National Gallery of Art, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. With Jacob Israel Biegeleisen he authored ''Silk Screen Stenciling as a Fine Art'' (1942), expanded to ''Silk Screen Techniques'' (1958).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cohn, Max Arthur 20th-century British painters 1903 births 1998 deaths Federal Art Project artists Public Works of Art Project artists British emigrants to the United States