Experiencing Pictures

Xvii, 225 Pp. Black Cloth Lettered In Red. First Printing With 1932 Date On Title Page. Lightly Used, Would Be Near Fine But Some Water Stains On Front Endpapers (Only) With Red-Offsetting From The Red Dust Jacket. Dust Jacket Itself Is Worn And With Some Fading Or Damp Staining, Spine Panel Almost Entirely Chipped Away But No Loss Of Text On Other Panels. Inscribed To Social Artist William Gropper, Whose Work Is Illustrated In The Book, "To Bill Gropper Design Conscious Artist Ralph M Pearson October 20, 1932." Ralph M. Pearson (1883-1958) Was An Accomplished Etcher At A Time When The Art Was Just Emerging As A Popular Medium In The United States. Pearson's Prints Show A Wide Variety Of Subjects Including Landscapes, Industrial Scenes, Indian Pueblos, And Portraits. The Images Are Reveal A Sophisticated Design Sense, Clearly Employing Compositional Strategies Of Artists Such As Arthur Wesley Dow Which Emphasized The Inter-Relationship Of Line, Mass, And Value In Two Dimensions. Pearson Studied At The Art Institute Of Chicago Under John Vanderpoel. Later, In New York Pearson “Found The First School Of Modern Art In This Country” Led By Hugo Robus. In His Words He “Inaugurated A Painful Unlearning And Relearning Process Of Some Eight Years’ Duration Which Was A Cheap Enough Price To Pay For A Basic Reorientation.” He Married Margaret Hale (The Daughter Of Classics Professor William Gardner Hale) In June Of 1916. In 1919 He Settled In The Foothills Of The Taos Mountains. Shortly Thereafter He Started An Unlikely Combination Business Venture Featuring Hogs And Greeting Cards. Apparently, He Was Better At Etching Than Pig Farming And Soon The Etching Sales Were Paying For The Pigs Upkeep. By 1920 He Had Given Up On The Pig Adventure And Concentrated On His Greeting Card Business Which Was Doing Quite Well. He Bought A “Big New Press” And Enlarged His Studio. By 1921 He Had Forty Different Vendors Selling His Cards In Cities Throughout The Country. Joseph O’Kane Foster, A Former Hearst Newspaper Reporter From Chicago, Had Moved To Taos And Soon Was Adding His Artistic And Literary Skills To The Enterprise. By 1923 Pearson Decided To Leave His Wife And Foster In Charge Of The Company And He Moved To California. The Company Name Was Changed To Vancil Foster Greeting Cards. Pearson And Hale Divorced. Foster Married Hale. They Closed The Business In 1928. In California Pearson Continued His Etching And Was Represented By The Stendahl Gallery In Los Angeles. His Best Know Work From This Period Was His “Cypress Grove” Of Monterey. For Pearson This Was His Final Break From The Representational Style Of His Youth. By 1928 He Had Remarried And Returned To New York To Start Another Career As An Educator, Art Critic And Author. He Taught For 10 Years At The New School For Social Research In New York. He Also Founded The Design Workshop, An Independent School, With Summer And Winter Classes, In Painting, Drawing And Critical Appreciation. These Classes, Planned As Condensed Courses, Gradually Evolved Into Teaching The Same Subjects By Mail. He Also Taught One-Year Stints At Utah State And At The University Of Texas In Austin. He Focused His Attention On Writing With Seven Books To His Credit As Well As Over 250 Magazine Articles. Pearson Was A Member Of The Chicago Society Of Etchers, The New York Society Of Etchers, California Art Club, California Society Of Etchers And The Brooklyn Society Of Etchers. He Exhibited Widely And Won Numerous Awards Including A Medal At The Panama-Pacific International Exposition. …