Lester Johnson Self Portrait Essay

Even before Lester Johnson moved to New York City, the man had developed a definite style that hinted of being a future avant-garde, a rebel that took whatever he could use from the various artistic movements while leaving the rules and hindrances behind. One notable thing about this man is the critics, gallery owners, patrons, not even other artists knew exactly how to label him until the 1960’s. Until the day Johnson died, on May 30, 2010, this enigma routinely changed up in both the models numbers and subjects whenever his energy started to drop or the creative spirit cried out in frustration.,

Johnson, in grammar and high school, was encouraged to pursue an interest in art, advice which the young artist willingly followed. There were

There are heavy layers of oil paints that shadow and reveal where the man scrapped the paint off or placed a lot to create an impression of depth. There were streaks of paint that covered his hands, which held a paintbrush, tip upward, which provided the paint that showed on his hands and parts of his clothing.showed his hurry to complete the piece and gives a . The three heads on this canvas, entitled Self Portrait, is larger than life, with the three ages of Johnson all looking down on me as the viewer as if he was judging my right to judge his art, all eyes seemed to follow my every movement. This does fit his main ideas for the first several years, all the images on the canvas resembled and were meant to symbolize him, plus the concept of time was one of his biggest drives while he painted the images. Another aspect was that the image had a left to right style of paint of brush strokes to it, since the man moved across the surface, paint brush sweeping in broad strokes, in a motion that somehow gave the painting a sense of motion and energy that this artist viewed as the whole point of creativity. There is even a glint in his eyes and the suggestion the man was amused by my reaction. The real painting made the various critics who wrote rave reviews make a little sense, though I still do not particularly like the style of this