Howard Kalish, submitted artwork
Howard Kalish
Painting, Sculpture
Brooklyn, NY
Howard Kalish was born and lives in New York City. His art studies included the High School of Music & Art, Cooper Union and the New York Studio School. After art school he bgan as a painter, though also making sculpture. In his early twenties he started to focus primarily on figurative sculpture. His sculpture gradually evolved over the years into the abstract, and then gradually evolved again to be figurative. Further evolution in recent years has resulted in a primary focus once again on painting, which he plans to continue into the foreseeable future. Whether working figuratively or abstractly, in sculpture or painting, the use of color has always been an important element in his art-making. While working abstractly he executed many public art commissions. They are installed in Baton Rouge LA; Florida International University, Miami, FL; Palm Desert, CA; Rockville, MD; the Jupiter campus of Florida Atlantic University, El Paso, TX, Indiana State University,Terre Haute, IN; Vacaville, CA; Hartford, CT; Utica, NY; and Memphis, TN.. He has had numerous exhibitions in museums and art galleries, and his work is included in many public and private collections.He has taught sculpture at New York University and the National Academy,. He has been the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Grant. His work has been written about in many publications, including the NY Times, Art in America and Artforum. He is an academician member of the National Academy.
Works
Howard Kalish, submitted artwork
I am a painter and a sculptor. These are usually included in the category "visual artist". This might lead one to believe they are closely related. But I have concluded after long experience with both that they are more like cousins who were born and grew up in different countries, speaking and thinking different languages. The difference can be confirmed by observing a cat, or a child. Show a cat a picture of a mouse and you will draw a blank. Give it something that looks remotely like a mouse, for instance an old sock stuffed with cotton, it will play with it as if it were a mouse, though it knows it is not. A young child will instinctively make a drawing given a piece of paper and a crayon, but will play with a sculpture (doll), and only try to make something out of a lump of clay if encouraged to do so. Consequently the expressive possibilities of each discipline are very different. That is the reason I have been drawn to make painting or sculpture at different times in my life: at different times I wanted to express that which could only be expressed in one or the other. A sculpture is an entity, a being, if you will, whether figurative or abstract. A painting is a drama, something is happening on the picture plane. (There can an area between, as in a relief sculpture or a portrait painting). I have come to making paintings in recent years because I want to express aspects of the drama that is life as it is lived now.
