Wyeth's hyper realist paintings during the modern art era of the 1950s contrasted with the mainly abstractionist style of the time with painters such as Jackson Pollock, etc.
Wyeth would paint the landscapes of his childhood home in Chadds Ford, PA and of his summer home in Maine. The simple portraits and landscapes almost appear photographic and it is his ability to devote so much detail in a painting with such seemingly simple subject matter that I think he was able to achieve Modern Art era status. Wyeth was known as the "painter of the people" and has made work for over 50 years recently passing away in January 2009.
Wyeth is, hands down, my favorite painter. His paintings are so well painted that I view them as photographs. It is his landscapes that really hit home with me because they remind me so much of the Shenandoah Valley's rolling hills. All his paintings would need are the Blue Ridge rising up in the background of Christina's World and it would be our farm in Stuarts Draft. I am also drawn to his landscapes involving a lone figure facing away-towards the landscape-that really speaks to me. There is just so much of a similarity between his paintings and many of my own photographs, yet that could be because he inspires me to make photographs for I could never paint that well...
A singular Wyeth painting, for me, evokes so much nostalgia that when looking at his paintings in person, and i have seen Christina's World at the MoMA, that I am actually filled with "Compassion Fatigue" and that is my true love for my landscapes of home.
This painting reminds me of a photograph of my father taken back when he was a young man in the 50s
This is my great aunt, 88 years old, sitting unable to move staring out of her "picture window"
Christina's World
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