Jacob Kainen (December 7, 1909 – March 19, 2001) was an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

painter and printmaker. He is also known as an art historian, writing books on

John Baptist Jackson John Baptist Jackson (1701–1780) was a British artist, a woodcut printmaker of the eighteenth century. He lived and worked in Paris and Venice. Jackson was prolific, ambitious and innovative within the medium, and produced both chiaroscuro and p ...

(US

Government Printing Office The United States Government Publishing Office (USGPO or GPO; formerly the United States Government Printing Office) is an agency of the legislative branch of the United States Federal government. The office produces and distributes information ...

, Washington, DC, 1962) and the etchings of

Canaletto Giovanni Antonio Canal (18 October 1697 – 19 April 1768), commonly known as Canaletto (), was an Italian painter from the Republic of Venice, considered an important member of the 18th-century Venetian school. Painter of city views or ...

(Smithsonian Press, Washington, DC, 1967). In addition, Kainen was a collector of German Expressionist art, and he and his second wife, Ruth, donated a collection of this work to the

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...

in 1985.

Biography

Jacob Kainen was born in

Waterbury, Connecticut Waterbury is a city in the U.S. state of Connecticut on the Naugatuck River, southwest of Hartford and northeast of New York City. Waterbury is the second-largest city in New Haven County, Connecticut. According to the 2020 US Census, in 20 ...

, in 1909. As the second of three sons born to

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

immigrants, Kainen grew up in a family that appreciated culture and talent. His father's artistry as an inventor and his mother's love for music and literature undoubtedly fostered in Kainen an insatiable interest in art. Even at age ten, Kainen was eager to study master works, including clippings of art reproductions from ''

The Jewish Daily Forward ''The Forward'' ( yi, פֿאָרווערטס, Forverts), formerly known as ''The Jewish Daily Forward'', is an American news media organization for a Jewish American audience. Founded in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily socialist newspaper, '' ...

'' in his scrapbooks. In 1918 the family moved to New York City, where Kainen's budding passion would further advance with trips to

The Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 F ...

and the

New York Public Library The New York Public Library (NYPL) is a public library system in New York City. With nearly 53 million items and 92 locations, the New York Public Library is the second largest public library in the United States (behind the Library of Congress ...

. Poetry and literature became major components of his artistic study during high school. When Kainen graduated from

DeWitt Clinton High School , motto_translation = Without Work Nothing Is Accomplished , image = DeWitt Clinton High School front entrance IMG 7441 HLG.jpg , seal_image = File:Clinton News.JPG , seal_size = 124px , ...

at sixteen, he was too young to be admitted to the

Pratt Institute Pratt Institute is a private university with its main campus in Brooklyn, New York (state), New York. It has a satellite campus in Manhattan and an extension campus in Utica, New York at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute. The school was ...

. In the meantime he took drawing classes at the

Art Students League The Art Students League of New York is an art school at American Fine Arts Society, 215 West 57th Street in Manhattan, New York City, New York. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists ...

, where

Kimon Nicolaides Cimon or Kimon ( grc-gre, Κίμων; – 450BC) was an Ancient Athens, Athenian ''strategos'' (general and admiral) and politician. He was the son of Miltiades, also an Athenian ''strategos''. Cimon rose to prominence for his bravery fighting in ...

taught him to "trust in the freedom and sureness of his hand." It was during this period that Kainen made his first prints,

drypoint Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate (or "matrix") with a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point. In principle, the method is practically identical to engraving. The ...

etchings Etching is traditionally the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio (incised) in the metal. In modern manufacturing, other chemicals may be used on other types ...

. Kainen used this time to further exercise his interests by working in the classics department of

Brentano's Brentano's was an American bookstore chain with numerous locations in the United States. As of the 1970s, there were three Brentano's in New York: the Fifth Avenue flagship store at Rockefeller Center, one in Greenwich Village, and one in Whit ...

bookstore, as well as developing his skills as a boxer. Kainen would go on to become an expert in the classics and quite a skilled amateur prizefighter. Kainen was finally granted admittance to Pratt in the fall of 1927. Though Kainen had a deep interest and appreciation for the old masters during this period of his life, he quickly found the Pratt curriculum backward, too anti-

modernist Modernism is both a philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new forms of art, philosophy, an ...

, and dogmatic. Upon entering school his portraits and color choices remained warm in tone, but as he progressed they became brighter and more reminiscent of Cézanne's palette. In Kainen's final year of school, Pratt instituted a curriculum that focused more on

commercial art Commercial art is the art of creative services, referring to art created for commercial purposes, primarily advertising. Commercial art uses a variety of platforms (magazines, websites, apps, television, etc.) for viewers with the intent of promo ...

and commercialized drawing styles. This

catalyzed Catalysis () is the process of increasing the rate of a chemical reaction by adding a substance known as a catalyst (). Catalysts are not consumed in the reaction and remain unchanged after it. If the reaction is rapid and the catalyst recyc ...

Kainen into a rebellion that resulted in his expulsion from the institute three weeks before graduation, and subjected him to further scorn from many of those associated with Pratt. This event proved monumental in Kainen's conceptual and artistic development. After his expulsion, Kainen sought out other

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

artists in the city, especially those who shared his institutional disdain. It led him to begin to engage with the emotive palette and gestures of

German Expressionism German Expressionism () consisted of several related creative movements in Germany before the First World War that reached a peak in Berlin during the 1920s. These developments were part of a larger Expressionist movement in north and central ...

and the social awareness and ferocity of

social realism Social realism is the term used for work produced by painters, printmakers, photographers, writers and filmmakers that aims to draw attention to the real socio-political conditions of the working class as a means to critique the power structure ...

during the 1930s. He became a part of the New York Group, "interested in those aspects of contemporary life which reflect the deepest feelings of the people; their poverty, their surroundings, their desire for peace, their fight for life." His expressionist and social leanings began to definitively merge in the mid-1930s in works such as Tenement Fire (1934) and The Flood (1936).

Career

Kainen also frequented cafeterias that had become the places where urban artists met to debate and develop ideas, both social and aesthetic. Kainen and

Arshile Gorky Arshile Gorky (; born Vostanik Manoug Adoian, hy, Ոստանիկ Մանուկ Ատոյեան; April 15, 1904 – July 21, 1948) was an Armenian-American painter who had a seminal influence on Abstract Expressionism. He spent the last years of his ...

became acquainted during a particular exchange in which they both defended the importance of copying master works and admitted to lurking in museums. The friendship with Gorky and his influence that resulted from their meeting would prove to be a lifelong one. Kainen was an active participant in the

WPA WPA may refer to: Computing *Wi-Fi Protected Access, a wireless encryption standard *Windows Product Activation, in Microsoft software licensing * Wireless Public Alerting (Alert Ready), emergency alerts over LTE in Canada * Windows Performance An ...

's graphic arts program during the second half of the decade, but he eventually parted with the aesthetics of

in favor of

abstraction Abstraction in its main sense is a conceptual process wherein general rules and concepts are derived from the usage and classification of specific examples, literal ("real" or "concrete") signifiers, first principles, or other methods. "An abstr ...

. Yet his work would never lose its humanism or its concern for history: "However abstract the forms and colors seem, they should somehow give off an aura of human experience." When opportunities in New York for work with the WPA ran low, Kainen moved to

Washington, DC ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan ...

. in 1942.

Curator

From 1942 to 1970 Kainen was curator of the Division of Graphic Arts at the Smithsonian's U. S. National Museum. Though jarred by the elementary state of Washington's then slow-paced art scene, Kainen found inspiration in the Victorian skyline and architecture that defined the buildings surrounding his studio in

Dupont Circle Dupont Circle (or DuPont Circle) is a traffic circle, park, neighborhood and historic district in Northwest Washington, D.C. The Dupont Circle neighborhood is bounded approximately by 16th Street NW to the east, 22nd Street NW ...

. In the 1940s he was one of the first abstract artists working in the city, and produced abstract compositions of symbols and forms that resounded with both his physical surroundings and personal experiences. In 1949 Kainen's national loyalty was questioned and he was placed under investigation by the Civil Services loyalty board. During the 1930s, and the time spent in New York after his expulsion from Pratt, Kainen had written art reviews for the ''

Daily Worker The ''Daily Worker'' was a newspaper published in New York City by the Communist Party USA, a formerly Comintern-affiliated organization. Publication began in 1924. While it generally reflected the prevailing views of the party, attempts were m ...

'' and signed legal petitions that attempted to institute social change. Such activities later put his job in jeopardy when he was being considered an "enemy of the state". Kainen was not cleared of formal charges until 1954. The psychological strain and anxiety of this period became evident in his vivid abstractions with titles like Exorcist (1952), Unmoored #2 (1952) and The Listener (1952). Kainen later remembered this time as a period when: "I begin with the aesthetic balancing of forms but these psychological ghosts take over." Soon after his clearance by the Civil Services board, Kainen shifted from abstraction to elegant figurative work. As evidence of fervent independence, Kainen rejected the popularity of

Abstract Expressionism Abstract expressionism is a post–World War II art movement in American painting, developed in New York City in the 1940s. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve international influence and put New York at the center of the ...

for a return to the figure. Kainen began to participate in substantially more exhibitions in Washington after he met his wife, Ruth Cole, in 1968. Prior to their marriage Kainen painted nightly after his workday, at his unheated studio, until ten or eleven o'clock at night, then returned home to do writing or museum research until 2 a.m. because he was not allowed to do scholarly writing on government time. Kainen retired from the Smithsonian in 1970 in order to paint full-time. Kainen taught evening classes in painting and printmaking at the Washington Workshop Center for the Arts, and was instrumental in introducing

Morris Louis Morris Louis Bernstein (November 28, 1912 – September 7, 1962), known professionally as Morris Louis, was an American painter. During the 1950s he became one of the earliest exponents of Color Field painting. While living in Washington, D.C ...

Kenneth Noland Kenneth Noland (April 10, 1924 – January 5, 2010) was an American painter. He was one of the best-known American color field painters, although in the 1950s he was thought of as an abstract expressionist and in the early 1960s he was though ...

and hiring Louis to teach painting at the Workshop. Shortly thereafter, Louis and Noland began collaborating on "staining", the fundamental notion of Washington Color Field Painting, and a groundbreaking technique with many influential practitioners, although Kainen did not consider himself to be a member of the Washington Color School. After his departure from the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...

in 1970, his work shifted back to pure abstraction.

Exhibitions

* ''Jacob Kainen'' (Retrospective). Catholic University, Washington, D.C., December, 1952; organized by

. * ''Jacob Kainen: Recent Paintings''. Middendorf Gallery, Washington, D.C., April 9-May 7, 1988 * ''Jacob Kainen: Recent Drawings''. Nancy Drysdale Gallery, Washington, D.C. March 23-April 29, 1995.

Death

Jacob Kainen died in his home in Chevy Chase, Maryland, at the age of 91 as he was preparing to go to his studio to paint. He was the father of mathematician Paul Kainen and inventor Daniel Kainen.

References

External links

Official website of the Jacob Kainen Art Trust

Works in the Collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum
*

Smith, Roberta Roberta Smith (born 1948) is co-chief art critic of ''The New York Times'' and a lecturer on contemporary art. She is the first woman to hold that position. Early life Born in 1948 in New York City and raised in Lawrence, Kansas. Smith studied a ...

"Jacob Kainen, 91, Painter and Print Curator,"
''The New York Times'', March 23, 2001
Archives of American Art, Jacob Kainen papers, 1905-2003
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Kainen, Jacob Abstract expressionist artists 20th-century American painters American male painters Jewish American artists 1909 births 2001 deaths American art historians Artists from Waterbury, Connecticut DeWitt Clinton High School alumni Art Students League of New York alumni Pratt Institute alumni American people of Russian-Jewish descent Smithsonian Institution people People from Chevy Chase, Maryland Federal Art Project artists 20th-century American printmakers Historians from New York (state) Artists from Maryland Artists from Washington, D.C. Historians from Connecticut Historians from Maryland 20th-century American Jews 20th-century American male artists