het kind en het badwater [ 4 ]

aan het begin van de eenentwintigste eeuw lijken steeds meer schilders
te beseffen wát we in de twintigste eeuw overboord gezet hebben

Terugblikkend op de schilderkunst van de twintigste eeuw, lijkt het alsof honderd jaar geleden met een waaier van „ismen„ voorgoed een einde is gekomen aan de traditionele ambachtelijke schilderkunst en daarmee ook aan het klassieke onderwijs dat zich richt op de basis: de techniek. Toch is de traditionele academische schilderkunst nooit weggeweest en heeft ze decennialang tijdens het modernisme ondergronds doorgewerkt. Na 1990 is de schilderkunst die verder gaat in het spoor van de Oude Meesters weer duidelijk bovengronds zichtbaar. In de eenentwintigste eeuw lijken we bevrijd van vernieuwingsdrang. In de post-moderne tijd is traditionele realistische schilderkunst geen anachronisme meer. Alles bestaat immers naast elkaar.

leerlingen van Richard Lack
Charles Cecil en Daniel Graves studeerden allebei onder Richard Lack. Eerstgenoemde was ook nog even leerling van diens leermeester Robert Hale Ives Gammell aan het einde van de jaren zestig

De vorige keer heb ik laten zien dat de traditie van de Académie van de negentiende eeuw via eenlingen is doorgegeven tot in onze tijd. De Amerikaanse schilder Richard Frederic Lack (1928) is daarin een sleutelfiguur. Hij begon in navolging van zijn leermeester Robert Hale Ives Gammell in 1969 een eigen studio om de negentiende eeuwse traditie van de Académie door te geven. Ives Gammell en Lack werden als reactionaire schilders niet serieus genomen en eerder als zonderlingen beschouwd. Twee van hun leerlingen Charles Cecil en Daniel Graves zouden niet hun hele leven meer tegen de stroom in hoeven te zwemmen, want na 1990 veranderde het klimaat. Cecil en Graves hadden al in 1982 een eigen academie in Florence opgericht en het werd steeds duidelijker dat er weer vraag kwam naar klassiek schilderonderwijs. In 1991 stopten Cecil en Graves hun samenwerking en begon de laatste de Florence Academy of Art terwijl Cecil de academie in Florence voortzette onder de naam Charles Cecil Studios

Charles Cecil
Charles Cecil
Florence (50 x 60 cm)
Charles Cecil , born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1945, Charles H. Cecil was raised in Winnetka Illinois. He attended Haverford College in Pennsylvania and graduated with degrees in art history and the classics. Cecil was awarded an NDEA grant to continue his studies of art history at Yale. Following graduate study, Cecil was awarded the coveted Greenshields Foundation grant and studied with R.H. Ives Gammell at his Fenway Studio in Boston, and then with Richard Frederick Lack at Atelier Lack in Minneapolis. A fellowship from the Stacey Foundation afforded him the opportunity to paint landscapes in Europe. Cecil first traveled to Italian hill towns during summers to paint, and then moved to Florence permanently. He has twice received major awards at the National Academy of Design in New York: The Hallgarten Prize for oil painting and the Altman Prize for landscape.
Charles Cecil
werk van een van Charles Cecil‘s leerlingen
In Florence, Cecil collaborated with fellow realist Daniel Graves to found Studio Cecil-Graves, for the education of young painters in historic traditional drawing and oil painting methods. Studio Cecil-Graves was a small, intimate atelier program where the two painters taught a select handful of passionate students who shared a frustration at the lack of pragmatic, hands on training of techniques and methods of painting and drawing. During 1991, the two artists parted ways and Charles Cecil remained at the original studio, establishing his own Atelier: Charles H. Cecil Studios, a School of Art in the Naturalist Tradition. Cecil’s figurative paintings are represented in numerous international collections, including the American Philosophical Society and Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. He is listed in Who’s Who in America and Who’s Who in American Art. An avid Art Historian and captivating speaker, Charles Cecil has served as a popular lecturer at The British Institute of Florence.
Daniel Graves
Daniel Graves landschappen

Daniel Graves is the founder (1991) and director of the Florence Academy of Art in Florence, Italy. The school is dedicated to providing the highest level of instruction in classical drawing, painting and sculpture. His philosophy demands a return to discipline in art, to canons of beauty, and to the direct study of nature and the Old Masters as the foundation for great painting. Graves graduated Cum Laude from the Maryland Art Institute.
( Bron: askart.com )

Daniel GravesCharles Daniel Graves born in Rochester, New York in 1949, is an oil painter, etcher, and Director of The Florence Academy of Art, which he founded in 1991. He lives and works in Florence, Italy, his home for almost thirty years. In his painting and teaching, he blends a broad array of training and experience. He studied with Joseph Sheppard (1930) and Frank Russell at the Maryland Art Institute in 1972, where he graduated with Cum Laude. He also studied (1972 – 73) with Richard Serrin (zie kader hieronder) at the Villa Schifanoia Graduate School of Fine Art in Florence, with Richard Lack (1975 – 76) in Minneapolis, and with Nerina Simi (1978) at her atelier in Florence, Italy. As a young painter living in Florence, he also associated with and was influenced by Pietro Annigoni. Together with colleague Charles Cecil, founded Cecil Graves Studio, where he also taught (1984-1991). Graves founded The Florence Academy of Art in 1991, where he is Executive Director and continues to teach.
 
Bron: quidleyandco.com

Richard SerrinRichard Serrin was born in Evanston, Illinois in 1928. His natural talent for drawing, a life-long love of literature, philosophy, and religious studies were instrumental in determining his course of life as an artist. Very early Richard developed a fascination for the masters of the 16th and 17th centuries, particularly Rembrandt. Today, some sixty years later, he is considered an authority on many of these masters, lecturing extensively on their techniques and compositions. After receiving his M.F.A. from Cranbrook Academy of Art, Serrin traveled in Mexico, Europe, and earlier, with the US Army, in Japan. After marrying in 1963, Richard and Dorothy moved to Amsterdam, and in 1964 to Italy, where their two daughters were born. The artist and his wife continue to reside in Florence. Bron: richardserrinart.com

Daniel Graves
Daniel Graves portret

Tenslotte vond ik op de website van artrenewal.org nog het artikel a new direction in art education van Gregory Hedberg waarin hij schrijft over de veranderingen na 1990 in het kunstonderwijs.

Daniel Graves: Steward of Humanist Art [ myamericanartist.com]