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The Curiosities of Janice Lowry
Every artist’s intent is to lead a full life of image-making, leaving a legacy of inspirational work. A prolific teacher, collage artist, painter, sculptor, and documentarian, Janice Lowry (1957-2009) succeeded at both goals. Her vibrant body of work continues to resonate with friends, family, students, and admirers all over the world. Former student and friend Mark Ryden contributes a heartfelt preface.
Lowry’s diary in 126 volumes, which she kept from age eleven, is in the Smithsonian Institution’s Archives of American Art — with pages featured here incorporating Lowry’s own voice into the text. Her sculptures and assemblages, drawing from Joseph Cornell’s shadow boxes, are surreal 3-D worlds made of a variety of materials — from worn paint, imperfect wood, and plastic doll parts to string, table legs, playing cards and deer antlers. Mixed-media paintings reinterpret 19th century cabinet cards, and dada-esque collages superimpose old and new elements, from 1950s domestic advertisements to celestial imagery.
The Curiosities of Janice Lowry is both an epitaph and an insightful look into the life and influences that shaped this intensely creative individual and is published as a celebration of Lowry’s career retrospective at the Grand Central Art Center in Santa Ana, California.
Lowry’s diary in 126 volumes, which she kept from age eleven, is in the Smithsonian Institution’s Archives of American Art — with pages featured here incorporating Lowry’s own voice into the text. Her sculptures and assemblages, drawing from Joseph Cornell’s shadow boxes, are surreal 3-D worlds made of a variety of materials — from worn paint, imperfect wood, and plastic doll parts to string, table legs, playing cards and deer antlers. Mixed-media paintings reinterpret 19th century cabinet cards, and dada-esque collages superimpose old and new elements, from 1950s domestic advertisements to celestial imagery.
The Curiosities of Janice Lowry is both an epitaph and an insightful look into the life and influences that shaped this intensely creative individual and is published as a celebration of Lowry’s career retrospective at the Grand Central Art Center in Santa Ana, California.
- GenresArt
251 pages, Hardcover
First published July 1, 2011
About the author
Mark Ryden
35 books65 followersBlending themes of pop culture with techniques reminiscent of the old masters, Mark Ryden has created a singular style that blurs the traditional boundaries between high and low art. His work first garnered attention in the 1990s when he ushered in a new genre of painting, "Pop Surrealism", dragging a host of followers in his wake. Ryden has trumped the initial surrealist strategies by choosing subject matter loaded with cultural connotation.
Ryden’s vocabulary ranges from cryptic to cute, treading a fine line between nostalgic cliché and disturbing archetype. Seduced by his infinitely detailed and meticulously glazed surfaces, the viewer is confronted with the juxtaposition of the childhood innocence and the mysterious recesses of the soul. A subtle disquiet inhabits his paintings; the work is achingly beautiful as it hints at darker psychic stuff beneath the surface of cultural kitsch. In Ryden's world cherubic girls rub elbows with strange and mysterious figures. Ornately carved frames lend the paintings a baroque exuberance that adds gravity to their enigmatic themes.
Mark Ryden received a BFA in 1987 from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. His paintings have been exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide, including a retrospective “Wondertoonel” at the Frye Museum of Art in Seattle and Pasadena Museum of California Art, and in the exhibition "The Artist's Museum" at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles.
Ryden’s vocabulary ranges from cryptic to cute, treading a fine line between nostalgic cliché and disturbing archetype. Seduced by his infinitely detailed and meticulously glazed surfaces, the viewer is confronted with the juxtaposition of the childhood innocence and the mysterious recesses of the soul. A subtle disquiet inhabits his paintings; the work is achingly beautiful as it hints at darker psychic stuff beneath the surface of cultural kitsch. In Ryden's world cherubic girls rub elbows with strange and mysterious figures. Ornately carved frames lend the paintings a baroque exuberance that adds gravity to their enigmatic themes.
Mark Ryden received a BFA in 1987 from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. His paintings have been exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide, including a retrospective “Wondertoonel” at the Frye Museum of Art in Seattle and Pasadena Museum of California Art, and in the exhibition "The Artist's Museum" at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
March 21, 2016
A beautiful, lavishly produced book that served as a wonderful introduction to Lowry's expansive and eclectic body of work. It was her collage work and journals—part diary, part art journal—that span some 120+ volumes that initially brought her to my attention, but going through this book it quickly becomes obvious how the kinetic, sensuous aura of combining together disparate objects and images is the principle underlying all of her work (which also takes the form of assemblages, sculptures, and paintings, along with collage).
The addended texts, particularly the remembrance by Mike McGee, were particularly helpful in giving a glimpse of the artist as a person, and how her personality subtly imbues all aspects of her work. Considering this book has a retrospective aspect to it—Lowry tragically passed away in 2009, only 63 years old—it's a great testament to the book that it nonetheless manages to pulsate with so much energy and life.
The addended texts, particularly the remembrance by Mike McGee, were particularly helpful in giving a glimpse of the artist as a person, and how her personality subtly imbues all aspects of her work. Considering this book has a retrospective aspect to it—Lowry tragically passed away in 2009, only 63 years old—it's a great testament to the book that it nonetheless manages to pulsate with so much energy and life.
Displaying 1 of 1 review