John Stuart Ingle (1933 – October 30, 2010) was an American
contemporary
Contemporary history, in English-language historiography, is a subset of modern history that describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. Contemporary history is either a subset of the late modern period, or it is o ...
realist artist, known for his meticulously rendered
watercolor
Watercolor (American English) or watercolour (British English; see spelling differences), also ''aquarelle'' (; from Italian diminutive of Latin ''aqua'' "water"), is a painting method”Watercolor may be as old as art itself, going back to ...
paintings
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...
, typically
still lifes. Some criticism has characterized Ingle's work as a kind of
magic realism. Ingle was born in
Indiana
Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th s ...
and died, aged 77, in
Minnesota
Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over to ...
.
Significant critical recognition of Ingle's work has included the publication of a book, ''The Eye and the Heart: Watercolors of John Stuart Ingle'' (Rizzoli International, 1988), authored by
Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist John Camp, and including an introduction by Frank H. Goodyear, Jr., president of the
(and author of ''
Contemporary
Contemporary history, in English-language historiography, is a subset of modern history that describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. Contemporary history is either a subset of the late modern period, or it is o ...
Realism
Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to:
In the arts
*Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts
Arts movements related to realism include:
*Classical Realism
*Literary realism, a move ...
since 1960''). The 110-page book on Ingle was published in conjunction with major solo exhibitions jointly sponsored by the
Wadsworth Atheneum
The Wadsworth Atheneum is an art museum in Hartford, Connecticut. The Wadsworth is noted for its collections of European Baroque art, ancient Egyptian and Classical bronzes, French and American Impressionist paintings, Hudson River School lands ...
in
Hartford, Connecticut, and the
Evansville Museum of Arts, History and Science
The Evansville Museum of Arts, History & Science is a general-interest museum located on the Ohio riverfront in downtown Evansville, Indiana, United States. Founded in 1904, it is one of Southern Indiana's most established and significant cultural ...
in
Evansville, Indiana
Evansville is a city in, and the county seat of, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States. The population was 118,414 at the 2020 census, making it the state's third-most populous city after Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, the largest city in ...
.
Style: intense, "virtuoso" realism
A 1991 ''New York Times'' review by Vivien Raynor remarked that "John Stuart Ingle proves that
Magic Realism lives in his virtuoso still life incorporating silver, peaches and a plant in a blue ceramic pot, all on a wood table".
The realism of Ingle's paintings can verge on the shocking, especially when, as is sometimes the case, a painting is radically larger than scale. In 2005, another ''New York Times'' reviewer wrote of "a giant, startlingly realistic watercolor by John Stuart Ingle showing tomatoes preserved in a
Mason jar
A Mason jar, also known as a canning jar or fruit jar, is a glass jar used in home canning to preserve food. It was named after American tinsmith John Landis Mason, who patented it in 1858. The jar's mouth has a screw thread on its outer perime ...
."
If Raynor is correct in characterizing Ingle as a kind of second- or third-generation
magic realist, then this is a magic realism closer to the ideals espoused by
Franz Roh in 1925 than to the style of what have commonly been called "magic realist" painters in the early 21st century. These latter-day magic realists have generally pursued a style closer to magic realism in literature, in which the realistic veers into the impossible or fantastic. In contrast, Roh advocated a faithful rendering of the exterior of what is actually observed, the idea being that when one really sees the world with full intensity, the ''inherent'' magic of things becomes evident, with no need to add fantastic, impossible, or supernatural elements to a picture. Ingle's own description of his approach to painting is philosophically in tune with Roh's ideal. Of his penetratingly precise realistic style, Ingle has written: "I don't want to make arbitrary changes in what I see to paint the picture, I want to paint what is given. The whole idea is to take something that's given and explore that reality as intensely as I can."
Askart.com further categorizes Ingle's style as not just realist, but
photo-realist. This designation would not, however, appear to be appropriate, given that in the introduction to the aforementioned monograph on the artist, Frank Goodyear (page 14) writes, "While not a photorealist, although he
ngledoes use the airbrush techniques of some photorealists, his finished watercolors do evince the incredible technical virtuosity of photorealism."
Collections
According to Askart.com, Ingle's work is in several notable public collections, including those of 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 ...
, the
Yale University Art Gallery
The Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG) is the oldest university art museum in the Western Hemisphere. It houses a major encyclopedic collection of art in several interconnected buildings on the campus of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. ...
, the
Evansville Museum of Arts, History and Science
The Evansville Museum of Arts, History & Science is a general-interest museum located on the Ohio riverfront in downtown Evansville, Indiana, United States. Founded in 1904, it is one of Southern Indiana's most established and significant cultural ...
, and the
Arkansas Arts Center (AAC). Below is an external link to a page providing information, with color images, on two works by Ingle in the AAC's collection. The
Art Institute of Chicago also includes one of Ingle's watercolors in its collection, according to the Institute's online catalogue.
See also
*
Realism
Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to:
In the arts
*Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts
Arts movements related to realism include:
*Classical Realism
*Literary realism, a move ...
*
Magic realism
*
Photo-realism
References
*John Camp; John Stuart Ingle (with introduction by Frank H. Goodyear);
Evansville Museum of Arts and Science;
Wadsworth Atheneum
The Wadsworth Atheneum is an art museum in Hartford, Connecticut. The Wadsworth is noted for its collections of European Baroque art, ancient Egyptian and Classical bronzes, French and American Impressionist paintings, Hudson River School lands ...
. ''The eye and the heart : watercolors of John Stuart Ingle'' (New York : Rizzoli; Evansville, Ind. : Evansville Museum of Arts & Science, 1988) (
WorldCat
WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the O ...
link
;
*John Stuart Ingle; Tatistcheff and Company. ''John Stuart Ingle : watercolors : November 2–30.'' (New York : Tatistcheff and Co., 1985) (Worldcat lin
OCLC 46464611
External links
Askart.compages on Ingle, including color images of the work
"ART; The Skill of the Watercolorist" - May 19, 1991 (Viven Raynor, reviewer)
Arkansas Art Center information (with access to color images - click on 'objects') on two works by Ingle in the museum's collection
"ART REVIEW; From Celebrity Faces to Creatures From Children's Books" - March 4, 2005 (Ken Johnson, reviewer)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ingle, John Stuart
1933 births
2010 deaths
People from Evansville, Indiana
20th-century American painters
American male painters
21st-century American painters
21st-century American male artists
American watercolorists
People from Minnetonka, Minnesota
Artists from Minnesota
20th-century American male artists