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Squeak Carnwath

American
(Abington, Pennsylvania, 1947 - )


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Biography

Squeak Carnwath’s paintings record her private thoughts and convey them with an innocence that disarms. She relies upon her materials to express rather than to render the photographic likeness of objects, and trusts in her ability to use paint to transmit her quirky, astute ideas. Carnwath has fashioned a personal syntax of numbers, words, and phrases that either augment or comprise the imagery of her compositions. Her paintings convey a sense of leafing through the artist’s journal and uncovering her intimate, whimsical musings, which unfold in stream-of-consciousness style.

From her early childhood in Pennsylvania, Carnwath instinctively embraced art making, and although her family did not take her to art museums, they did provide her with paints and other supplies. Carnwath’s artistic interests remained consistent over time, however it was not until high school that she imagined a career as a professional artist. As a young adult, she attended Monticello Junior College for Women in Godfrey, Illinois, where she majored in painting, and took a summer painting program on the island of Paros in Greece. At this time her influences included vernacular art, such as the work of Pennsylvania Dutch folk artists, the paintings of Grandma Moses, and musical influences, in particular the blues. Carnwath recalls traveling to New York to see a Jackson Pollock retrospective, and thereafter becoming more cognizant of the art world and subscribing to art magazines. After junior college, she attended Goddard College in Vermont before moving west, armed with an intense desire to leave the East Coast. She attended the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland and received her M.F.A. in 1977. Carnwath served as professor of art at the University of California, Davis, from 1983 to 1998, teaching painting and drawing; in 1998 she became professor in residence in the department of art practice at the University of California, Berkeley.

Fire and Striped Night depicts an image of a tree engulfed in flames, a solitary denizen of an otherwise featureless landscape. In a recent conversation, the artist noted that her landscapes tend to be desolate and devoid of vegetation, as though providing a stage upon which a scene might take place.1 Providing the compositional focus for the painting, the tree is rooted in a pool of water, markedly contrasting with the red-hot flames that consume the tree’s branches and leaves. Carnwath sees trees as stand-ins for human figures—here, the two main branches appear to be graceful arms, crossed in a posture suggesting both submission and defiance, and capped with white gloves. However, the tree is not referenced at all in the title, suggesting that the dramatic flames, fingering toward the sky and branding it with roseate striations, is the primary element in this painting. Both consuming and cleansing, the flames may indicate both destruction and power. Carnwath purposefully clouds any possibility of direct interpretation, enabling the painting to convey many possible meanings—for example, could the tree symbolize Daphne, the nymph of classical mythology, whom Apollo pursued with ardor? To avoid him, Daphne beseeched her father, the river god Peneus, to turn her into a tree; her arms became branches, her feet were transformed into roots, her face became a tree-top, and thereafter the nymph’s form was that of a laurel tree.

In a conversation with artist June Leaf, Carnwath observed, “Painting is not only a mnemonic device employed to remember events in our lifetime. Paintings address a greater memory. A memory less topical, one less provincial than the geography of our currently occupied body. Painting reminds us of what we don’t know but what we can recognize as familiar.”2 Carnwath’s paintings are distinguished by her ability to tap into a subconscious realm accessible to all dreamers, breathe deeply of its essence, and convey her message through seemingly simple, coloristically complex manipulations of paint on canvas. —J.N.

1. Squeak Carnwath, conversation with the author, 14 April 2004.
2. Squeak Carnwath: Recent Paintings, exh. cat. (San Francisco: John Berggruen Gallery, 1994), n.p.

(SJMA Selections publication, 2004)

Squeak Carnwath was born in 1947 in Abington, Pennsylvania and lives in Oakland, California. She attended the California College of Arts (formerly Arts and Crafts) and received her M.F.A in 1997. Carnwath served as a professor of art at the University of California, Davis, from 1983 to 1998, teaching painting and drawing; in 1998 she became professor in residence in the department of art practice at the University of California, Berkeley. She has been awarded the prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship, the SECA Award in Art, and the NEA Individual Artist Fellowship. Her work is in the collections of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the San Francisco Fine Arts Museums. This would be the second print and fourth work by Carnwath to enter SJMA’s permanent collection. (Portions excerpted from various sources.) (SJMA Collections Committee, 2005)

Born in Abington, Pennsylvania in 1947, Carnwath instinctively embraced art making as a child. Although her family did not take her to art museums, they did provide her with paints and other supplies. Carnwath’s artistic interests remained consistent over time; however it was not until high school that she imagined a career as a professional artist. She attended Monticello Junior College for Women in Godfrey, Illinois, where she majored in painting, and took a summer painting program on the island of Paros in Greece. At this time her influences included vernacular art, such as the work of Pennsylvania Dutch folk artists, the paintings of Grandma Moses, and musical influences, particularly the blues. Carnwath recalls traveling to New York to see a Jackson Pollock retrospective, and thereafter becoming more cognizant of the art world and subscribing to art magazines. After junior college, she attended Goddard College in Vermont before moving west, armed with an intense desire to leave the East Coast. She attended the California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland and received her M.F.A. in 1977. Carnwath served as professor of art at the University of California, Davis, from 1983 to 1998, teaching painting and drawing. In 1998 she became professor in residence in the department of art practice at the University of California, Berkeley. [Bio from Juicy Paint Exhibition, input by R. Faust, 8/1//2010]


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