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Top 200 20th Century Artists?

The Times and Saatchi gallery have compiled 1,461,523 votes from the public to come up with a list of the 200 top artists of the 20th Century. It’s a method that has flaws as some artists will be missing and other artists will get more attention than they really deserve, but any list compiled by anyone is flawed as lists are an art rather than a science. They’re not meant to be taken too seriously.

1 Pablo Picasso 21587

2 Paul Cezanne 21098

3 Gustav Klimt 20823

4 Claude Monet 20684

5 Marcel Duchamp 20647

6 Henri Matisse 17096

7 Jackson Pollock 17051

8 Andy Warhol 17047

9 Willem De Kooning 17042

10 Piet Mondrian 17028

11 Paul Gauguin 17027

12 Francis Bacon 17018

13 Robert Rauschenberg 16956

14 Georges Braque 16788

15 Wassily Kandinsky 16055

16 Constantin Brancusi 14224

17 Kasimir Malevich 13609

18 Jasper Johns 12988

19 Frida Kahlo 12940

20 Martin Kippenberger 12784

21 Paul Klee 12750

22 Egon Schiele 12696

23 Donald Judd 12613

24 Bruce Nauman 12517

25 Alberto Giacometti 12098

26 Salvador Dalí 11496

27 Auguste Rodin 8989

28 Mark Rothko 8951

29 Edward Hopper 8918

30 Lucian Freud 8897

31 Richard Serra 8858

32 Rene Magritte 8837

33 David Hockney 8787

34 Philip Guston 8786

35 Henri Cartier-Bresson 8779

36 Pierre Bonnard 8778

37 Jean-Michel Basquiat 8746

38 Max Ernst 8737

39 Diane Arbus 8733

40 Georgia O’Keeffe 8714

41 Cy Twombly 8708

42 Max Beckmann 8690

43 Barnett Newman 8643

44 Giorgio De Chirico 8462

45 Roy Lichtenstein 7441

46 Edvard Munch 5080

47 Pierre Auguste Renoir 5063

48 Man Ray 5050

49 Henry Moore 5045

50 Cindy Sherman 5041

51 Jeff Koons 5028

52 Tracey Emin 4961

53 Damien Hirst 4960

54 Yves Klein 4948

55 Henri Rousseau 4944

56 Chaim Soutine 4927

57 Arshile Gorky 4926

58 Amedeo Modigliani 4924

59 Umberto Boccioni 4918

60 Jean Dubuffet 4910

61 Eva Hesse 4908

62 Edouard Vuillard 4899

63 Carl Andre 4898

64 Juan Gris 4898

65 Lucio Fontana 4896

66 Franz Kline 4894

67 David Smith 4842

68 Joseph Beuys 4480

69 Alexander Calder 3241

70 Louise Bourgeois 3240

71 Marc Chagall 3224

72 Gerhard Richter 3123

73 Balthus 3090

74 Joan Miro 3087

75 Ernst Ludwig Kirchner 3084

76 Frank Stella 3078

77 Georg Baselitz 3048

78 Francis Picabia 3046

79 Jenny Saville 3034

80 Dan Flavin 3024

81 Alfred Stieglitz 3017

82 Anselm Kiefer 3010

83 Matthew Barney 3005

84 George Grosz 2990

85 Bernd And Hilla Becher 2980

86 Sigmar Polke 2966

87 Brice Marden 2947

88 Maurizio Cattelan 2940

89 Sol LeWitt 2926

90 Chuck Close 2915

91 Edward Weston 2899

92 Joseph Cornell 2893

93 Karel Appel 2890

94 Bridget Riley 2885

95 Alexander Archipenko 2884

96 Anthony Caro 2879

97 Richard Hamilton 2878

98 Clyfford Still 2864

99 Luc Tuymans 2862

100 Claes Oldenburg 2843

101 Eduardo Paolozzi 2839

102 Frank Auerbach 2836

103 Dinos and Jake Chapman 2827

104 Marlene Dumas 2827

105 Antoni Tapies 2825

106 Giorgio Morandi 2824

107 Walker Evans 2823

108 Nan Goldin 2819

109 Robert Frank 2818

110 Georges Rouault 2818

111 Jean Arp 2817

112 August Sander 2809

113 James Rosenquist 2808

114 Andreas Gursky 2804

115 Eugene Atget 2802

116 Jeff Wall 2790

117 Ellsworth Kelly 2789

118 Bill Brandt 2787

119 Christo And Jeanne Claude 2782

120 Howard Hodgkin 2781

121 Josef Albers 2781

122 Piero Manzoni 2777

123 Agnes Martin 2771

124 Anish Kapoor 2768

125 L.S. Lowry 2761

126 Robert Motherwell 2754

127 Robert Delaunay 2747

128 Stuart Davis 2742

129 Ed Ruscha 2731

130 Gilbert & George 2729

131 Stanley Spencer 2720

132 James Ensor 2719

133 Fernand Leger 2718

134 Brassai (Gyula Halasz) 2717

135 Alexander Rodchenko 2715

136 Robert Ryman 2711

137 Ad Reinhardt 2709

138 Hans Bellmer 2700

139 Isa Genzken 2699

140 Kees Van Dongen 2698

141 Weegee 2698

142 Paula Rego 2695

143 Thomas Hart Benton 2689

144 Hans Hofmann 2684

145 Vladimir Tatlin 2679

146 Odilon Redon 2653

147 George Segal 2619

148 Jorg Immendorff 2611

149 Robert Smithson 2435

150 Peter Doig 2324

151 Ed and Nancy Kienholz 2293

152 Richard Prince 2266

153 Ansel Adams 2262

154 Naum Gabo 2256

155 Diego Rivera 2239

156 Barbara Hepworth 2237

157 Nicolas De Stael 2237

158 Walter De Maria 2229

159 Felix Gonzalez-Torres 2228

160 Giacomo Balla 2225

161 Ben Nicholson 2221

162 Anthony Gormley 2218

163 Lyonel Feininger 2216

164 Emil Nolde 2213

165 Mark Wallinger 2211

166 Hermann Nitsch 2209

167 Paul Signac 2209

168 Jean Tinguely 2209

169 Kurt Schwitters 2209

170 Grayson Perry 2208

171 Julian Schnabel 2208

172 Raymond Duchamp-Villon 2208

173 Robert Gober 2208

174 Duane Hanson 2208

175 Richard Diebenkorn 2207

176 Alex Katz 2207

177 Alighiero E Boetti 2206

178 Henri Gaudier-Brzeska 2206

179 Laszlo Moholy-Nagy 2205

180 Jacques-Henri Lartigue 2205

181 Robert Morris 2205

182 Sarah Lucas 2204

183 Jannis Kounellis 2204

184 Chris Burden 2204

185 Otto Dix 2203

186 David Bomberg 2203

187 Fischli & Weiss 2203

188 Augustus John 2203

189 Marsden Hartley 2203

190 Takashi Murakami 2203

191 James Turrell 2202

192 Isamu Noguchi 2201

193 Robert Mangold 2201

194 John Chamberlain 2201

195 Charles Demuth 2200

196 John Currin 2200

197 Alberto Burri 2200

198 Arnulf Rainer 2200

199 David Salle 2200

200 Hiroshi Sugimoto 2199

Find out more about the top 200 20th century artists over at the TimesOnline and at Saatchi.

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A Guide to North American Birds by Matt Sesow

Before I went on my recent road trip I received a painting by Washington, DC. artist Matt Sesow called “A Guide to North American Birds.” I have a thing for birds and a thing for quirkiness so I really like the painting. I also buy art that I couldn’t or wouldn’t paint myself, so I end up buying bright, bold and colorful paintings which are in contrast to my own paintings that are almost colorless.

Guide to North American Birds - Matt Sesow

I bought these smaller works from Matt too..

Traumatized - Matt Sesow

Cardinal - Matt Sesow

Matt Sesow’s website can be found Here. I also mentioned a video by Matt Sesow earlier.

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Art Jobs Board

ArtInfo’s jobs board is now online. They’re listing art jobs, internships, artist residencies, artist opportunities, artist calls for entry and more.

Here’s some more info from Art Info..

“One of the strengths of ARTINFO is our network and our commitment to institutions and individuals within the art world. Because we realize the months ahead will continue to be challenging, we extend this offer to you to post your opportunity free of charge.

ARTINFO has a targeted audience of engaged art world individuals who interact on many different levels and within many different regions of the world. We have a global focus, but advocate a localized point of view. During this time, we would like to help you - our network - connect with potential opportunities” View their art jobs board here.

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Art and Spirituality

Brian from MyArtSpace has asked some interesting questions on his Spiritual Side of Art post..

“Has a specific work of art touched your soul? Can you recall a specific work of art that helped your through a difficult time or defined a time of joy for you? I know that some people suggest that there is no longer room for the spiritual in the art of today– do you agree? Or would you say that the spiritual aspects of art surround us just as they did in other periods of time? In your opinion, why does visual art have this power– why do viewers establish these personal connections?” My ArtSpace

I think most of the spirituality in art is in the making of art, with the artwork simply being the byproduct. So a painting can be of something unspiritual, if there is such a word, but the artist may have felt that he/she was touching god while painting it.

I have never seen an artwork that has “touched my soul” or moved me to tears, even though I have looked at lots of art and think of myself as a reasonably sensitive person. Installations and moving images have come close as they have more tools to play with. A painting or sculpture has to work harder to affect the viewer as it simply sits there with no movement or sound, so we have to do all the work ourselves if we are to end up in tears. Film on the other hand has more tools available to press our emotional buttons at will.

Art affects us on a more subtle level, it seeps into our soul rather than blows our mind on the spot. Good art will linger, it will hang around for weeks and months after viewing it, but it probably won’t make you cry or save your life. I think the viewer has to be content with knowing that the artwork is just the waste byproduct of something spiritual, which doesn’t necessarily make the finished piece spiritual. Sometimes that waste product works as a mirror or points to something greater and it affects a person deeply, but usually it just ends up as something pretty hanging a wall.

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Mary Cassatt

Google is celebrating the birth of the American impressionist painter Mary Cassatt with a Cassatt-ized Google logo.

It’s one of my favorite artist tributes from Google. Google does loud and colorful logos well, but this Mary Cassatt logo shows that they can do subtle and neutral colors too. See more Google logos here.

Mary Cassat was born on the 22nd of May, 1844 in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania and died near Paris, France on the 14th of June, 1926 at the age of 82.

The Mary Cassatt painting in the Google logo is “The Child’s Bath” from 1893. It is owned by the Art Institute of Chicago.

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Travel Photos

Yes, it’s an art blog and doesn’t have much to do with travel, but such is life. I have been ping ponging all over the place lately but I keep forgetting to take my camera with me. I managed to take a few snaps though.

(Click to see larger images)

In a hotel in Canberra I had this trippy ceiling that didn’t let my eye rest. I think as an artist you just let an image take you where it wants to go, but this wallpaper on my ceiling just made me dizzy.

Most trees at home are green all year, so I found these trees interesting. There was something romantic about walking down this path, even if I was alone.. and freezing.

See the parrots in the grass? That’s why they’re called Grass Parrots I guess. I have always loved birds and get pretty excited when I see them in the wild. Click on the image to see a larger version.

Here’s the view from my hotel in Melbourne.

Here’s another view of Melbourne.

One more photo of Melbourne city.

Then I felt like I needed sun and warmth so I jumped in the car and headed North again. I have landed in the commercialized hippy town of Byron Bay. It’s a strange combination of weekend hippies, far out hippies, wealthy retired people, surfers, and BMW driving yuppy types. Along with lots of Germans, Brits, Japanese, Americans, and a number of other nationalities.

Everytime I go to the Byron Bay lighthouse I seem to get wet.

One more Byron Bay photo.

I haven’t decided what I’m doing or where I’m going next, but I check out on Wednesday so I better hurry up and figure it out

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Lawmakers May Seek More Federal Money for Public Universities

Washington — Four years after a federal study panel gave Congress a wish list for assisting American research universities, a group of leading lawmakers has decided it may not have gone far enough.

The lawmakers, including the chairmen of the House and Senate science panels, are asking the National Academies to compile the “top 10 actions that Congress, state governments, research universities, and others could take” to maintain the quality of American research universities and ensure their role in American economic growth.

“We are concerned that they are at risk,” the four lawmakers said, citing both the steadily improving quality of foreign universities and the declining level of state support for public universities in the United States.

The lawmakers included Rep. Bart Gordon of Tennessee, chairman of the House science committee, and Sen. Barbara Mikulski of Maryland, chairwoman of the Senate subcommittee that handles science appropriations. The two others were Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Republican of Tennessee and a former U.S. education secretary, and Rep. Ralph Hall of Texas, the top Republican on the House science committee.

They described their request as a bid for a follow-up to the “Gathering Storm” report of 2005, in which a National Academies committee assembled a list of the 20 most important improvements that Congress could make in federal support for research and education.

The recommendations included doubling federal spending on the physical sciences over seven years. Congress has taken steps in that direction, approving a .5-billion jump in federal research-and-development spending in an economic-stimulus measure enacted this year.

And President Obama last month proposed a .9-billion budget for the National Institutes of Health for the 2010 fiscal year, setting a baseline 4.7 percent higher than the agency’s final budget under President Bush, in 2008.

The request Monday by the lawmakers was sparked in part by a letter in February to Senator Alexander from Robert M. Berdahl, president of the Association of American Universities, who said the government needed to address a “growing imbalance between public and private research universities.”

“Such an initiative should target a limited number of institutions in each state, the flagship campuses,” Mr. Berdahl said. “To succeed, it would need to provide additional federal resources, supplementing and leveraging state support rather than supplanting it.” —Paul Basken

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Iraq Appeals Anew to Exiled Academics to Return Home

Iraq’s government has issued a fresh appeal to the country’s exiled scientists, urging them to come home to help rebuild the economy, the Reuters news agency reported.

More than 200 exiled Iraqi scientists have been invited to a three-day conference sponsored this week in Baghdad by the Ministry of Science and Technology. The goal: Persuade them to return.

“You, the Iraqi brains, are an important part of driving the path we are on,” Sadeq al-Rikabi, a political adviser to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, told the scientists. “We are happy to see … these brains come back again, and I hope their return will not be just for a short time.”

What was once among the Arab world’s most extensive university networks has been shattered by the sectarian violence that has beset the country since the U.S.-led invasion of 2003. Hundreds of Iraqi professors were among those killed, and thousands of academics were driven into exile.

In recent months the violence seems to be abating, and Mr. al-Malaki’s office has set out an ambitious plan to return the country’s higher-education system to its former glory. Millions have been promised to send students to study overseas, and the government is keen to hook up Iraqi institutions with international partners. But what will be the key to the success of any plan to revive Iraqi higher education is the country’s ability to persuade Iraqi academics to return home.

So far, the Iraqi government says 700 professors from a range of academic fields have returned to the country. But among the scientists in Baghdad this week, Reuters reported that many had reservations about moving back to a country where civilians continue to be killed every day in gun and bomb attacks.

Mohammed al-Rubaie, a professor of genetic engineering at the University of Dublin, said he planned to make only short visits. “We do not want to come back [to stay], but there are ways,” he told Reuters. “Scientists could be invited for specific projects to give the benefit of their advice and experience. —Andrew Mills

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Trustees Defer College’s Plan to Rename Courses for Paid Sponsors

The City College of San Francisco’s Board of Trustees has temporarily repealed a plan to allow donors to sponsor classes that would otherwise be canceled, and to rename them in honor of their benefactors. The trustees said they had not been informed of the plan and needed to discuss it at a meeting on Thursday.

The college’s chancellor, Don Griffin, announced the plan on Monday but failed to notify the seven-member board beforehand. Board members told the San Francisco Chronicle they were irritated after they learned of the plan in Monday’s newspaper.

“Public education is not for sale,” Milton Marks, the board’s president, told the paper. “If someone wants to give money, that’s great. But getting publicity or feel-good points shouldn’t be necessary. It smacks of some sort of paternalism.”

Mr. Marks said there was no guarantee the proposal would ever be approved, but with the college facing cuts of -million to -million over the next few years, the board wasn’t ruling it out, either.

Since the plan was announced, no donors have offered the minimum ,000 gift to save a course, the San Francisco Chronicle reported, though several potential sponsors have asked if they could make partial donations. —Erica R. Hendry

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Liberty U. Makes Democratic and Republican Student Groups ‘Unofficial Clubs’

Liberty University has changed its policy on student groups, giving both its Democratic and Republican organizations a new status, “unofficial clubs,” according to The News & Advance, in Lynchburg, Va.

Last month the conservative Christian college took away the Democratic group’s official status. The policy shift allows its return.

Under the new policy, announced last weekend by Chancellor Jerry Falwell Jr., both the Democratic and Republican student groups will be unofficial clubs. Unofficial clubs will be allowed to use the university’s name, but will not receive funds from it. They may endorse candidates whose views the university deems contrary to its mission without losing their status, but will not be allowed to use university facilities to endorse such candidates. —Beckie Supiano

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