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January 2000
Poll: Who is Producing the Most Interesting Art Today?

We're at the halfway point in the voting for today's most interesting artist. Here are the standings as of December 31:
  1. Cindy Sherman
  2. Mark Tansey
  3. Chuck Close
  4. Odd Nerdrum
  5. Andrew Wyeth
 
Do you have an artist who surprises you? Who moves you? Whose new works you look forward to seeing? If you haven't voted yet, do so now before reading any further. Deadline is January 31.





Below are some comments people have made about why they voted for a particular artist:

 
Francesco Clemente is one of the few credible artist still working today. He has sustained an uncomprimising body of work over the last 20 years.
Eddie Gayle
 
Howard Hodgkin: The most sensual and elusively evocative painter this side of Bonnard.
Euros Rowlands
 
Dale Chihuly: His glorious dimensional work engulfs the viewer into a world that is beyond the imagination. The colors, the magnitude of the installations, and variations in themes stun my senses!
Judy Lehman
 
Sir Norman Foster, English Architect. The glass roof he designed for the unified German parliament is an incredible mix of aesthetic beauty combined with 21st century functionality; yet sits comfortably on top of historic building.
Mark Edward Arbon
 
I first became aware of the seriagraphy of Peter Max back in the late sixties when a lot of his prints appeared in such periodicals as 16 Magazine, TigerBeat, Flip, and Seventeen. His themese of the cosmos and the neat little men and their costumes were fascinating. I am very happy that some puzzles of his earlier works have been released. His modern style I do not enjoy as well, though it is freer and more expressive than his earlier styles.
 
Andrew Wyeth's work combines great sensitivity and subtlety with amazing technical mastery. No other artist alive today is capable of such fineness and brilliance.
Phil Hull
 
You cannot make a list of the most influential artists of this century without including Robert Rauschenberg, and you most definitely cannot make a list of artists who are currently working without including him.
John L. Clayton
 
Gordon Snidow presents the flavor of America in general and the American cowboy specifically. Now Snidow has added the American cowgirl. What more could anyone want???
Patric S. Hamit
 
I believe R.C. Gorman to be the most interesting artist today because of the way he marries his marvellous use of color in combination with his subjects, which are mainly Native American (Navajo), scenes with women along with the traditional and timeless beauty of Navajo jewelry, pottery, dress and tradition as well as the inclusion in many of his works of the breathtakingly beautiful American Southwest scenery. This man is so inspiring and his works bring such joy to me each time I view them. The world would be a much emptier place without this great artist in it!
Linda Bishop
 
Ian Callier: Great skills and the fact that he doesn't like idealess working. there's always something that touches (esthetically) plus a thought , and that thought is mostly a very clear one! You're not supposed to know art to understand his work. I like it a lot.
 
Anthony Gormley: Finest sculptures in England - he combines a radical approach with quite striking accessibility (and I don't mean just the Angel of the North because it's huge and next to the A1)!
Philip Resheph
 
Gary Hume: Just go and see his exhibition at the Whitechapel gallery to see how he burns through all that the rest of try to achieve...
 
Anderson Giles' use of color and light is incredible!
Mary Ruth Senn
 
Andrew Wyeth: The connection he makes with the land is beyond words. His work inspires me.
 
Andrew Gonazalez: Visit Andrew's website at Galerie Sublimatrix: http://www.sublimatrix.com
 
Lino Tagliapietra: He is one of the leading glass blowers of Murano, Italy and his work is as facinating as it is beautiful.
 
Toots Zynsky: Her technique and exquisite use of color is astounding.
 
Robert Mickelsen: His sense of humor and his sometimes bizarre outlook, combined with his skill as a glass artist, have put him in the forefront of the lampworking or flameworking technique.
 
Mark Tansey: One of the most visually compelling and innovative and intellectually sophisticated artists of his generation.
 
Michael Tracy (aka tracy 168) was a graffiti artist and is still working. His pieces he has drawn a starting line to actually represent to all of the people in the world that graffiti has artistic values. Please recognize graffiti and look at what it has to offer the artistic world.
 
Thomas Lyon Mills works in that area where memory and sensual experience meet. He creates private, quiet, yet intensely emotionally charged spaces; hybrids of his experiences in different places in the world. His work is inventive and deeply felt. Magical.
Lizzie Phelps
 
Jack Vettriano creates paintings for today. He is doing the same thing that Waterhouse and Parrish, maybe even Turner and Gainsborough, did for their day. There is a connection between "Blue Boy" and "Mr. Cool."
 
Regina Frank: Her artwork is beautiful and the theoretical implications behind them is amazing and deep.
Kate Ryan
 
Greg A. Olsen: His art work is of the newest medium I've seen. He is the first artist to romanticly blend poetic language with computer generated visual beauty. His art work appears to connect with your imagination and the words seem to stir your soul. I highly recommend everyone I know to look at the framed art work I have of his. Greg as an individual teaches any one who asks how to create your own art. His ombiance seems to carry the feeling of comfort when he lets you recognize your own creative spirit. Best Luck to Him and his admirers!
 
Anish Kapoor: The site specific Baltic work - wow.
 
After studying Ann Hamilton's work along with a dozen other artists who exhibited at the Carnegie International, I found her work to be highly thought provoking and sensitive along with the highest standard of technical execution.
Amy Ruby
 
Lucien Freud: His figures make you feel human.
norbert marszalek
 
Balthus: Sincerely, the most interesting artist of the 20th century.
 
Sigmar Polke is the most interesting artist today as he produces his works without the doggy seriousness of a Kiefer or Richter. His works transcend Pop-Art, though are inspired by it. Are never engaged in any political opinions (which would be completely obsolete nowaday), obstruct any simple interpretation and are always very funny. The paintings changing colour with temperature and the ones experimenting with 3-dimensional effects and light in the german "Reichstag" are innovative and still of a very special humour. Polke maintains the correct amount of indifference towards the major civilisational problems and ridicules them nevertheless. His parodies on traditional art (Duerer, Goya etc.) and his imitations of postmodern strategies of advertising show that he is a master of all styles without assessing one of them seriously, which seems to me to be the right attitude towards everything appearing in museums nowadays.
Daniel Marestani
 
Eyvind Earle: His works have a radience beyond beauty in the creation of what he sees in natural scenery. Stylistically appealing through a dreamlike enhancement of the world, his work has been geat in the 70-plus years that he's been painting.
Karl Williams
 
Ernest J.T. Martin is an internationally collected and exhibited fine arts painter and sculptor, an abstract expressionist, and probably one of the last living members of the Cedars Street Bar gang. A friend and contemporary of Kline, Pollock, DeKooning, Krasner, he is not well known in the US, although those who do know his work are avid collectors and fans. His utilization of bold colors and exquisite composition highlight his sensitive and perceptive treatment of his subjects. He is 72 years of age, the recipient of numerous awards for his art, and has had a career and life that are the equivalent of ten "normal lives". A combat veteran of World War II, a professional Matador, an archaeologist in Europe and South and Central America, a published author and poet, a patented inventor of three inventions, Mr. Martin has been dubbed by many as the true "Renaissance Man." Ernest Martin's artistic goals are to bring to light the true spiritual beingness of mankind, giving us the historical insight and powers derived from being aware, to create a greater future. This is an exceptional fine artist.
Lyn Adelstein
 
The art of Will Brent most simply stated is amazing. His work expresses the essence of love, romance, and passion in their purist form. Anyone that has been blessed with the opportunity to view any piece in his collection is temporarily transported into a world of peace and bliss. Will Brent is definitely an artist producing the most interesting art for today and the millenium.
ShaNay Montez Norvell
 
Agnes Martin is one of the most amazing living artists of our time. Now the artist is in her late 80's and continues to create her "silent" paintings and drawings. Living secluded in Taos, New Mexico, Martin defies new trends in art, sticking to her simple, personal style.
Robert Spees
 
Louise Bourgeois: In this art department, the art professors claim that only artists living in new york (usa) or showing in new york have any value. I say bullshit. The greatest living artist is probably creating at this very moment in the middle of nowhere. Americans always think they are making the best art, but usually there is no foundation behind their work. Female artists are always undervalued.
 
This is my own theory, for what it's worth. I feel that there is a definite visual and perhaps spiritual lineage from Cezanne to Picasso to Hockney. These three have exemplified the best of experimental, developmental and innovative art for each of their respective generations. That their lives overlap is no less coincidental than the fact that thier work overlaps in so many ways. The photo and video images that involve many different viewpoints incorporated into a single, composite image is the grandchild of Cezanne's odd perspectives and the son of Cubism. David Hockney is the heir to this legacy. His work is truly the most exciting art being created in our time. He has no peers. He is above and beyond the rest by light years. He has designed Grand Opera. His drawings are masterfully simplified. His paintings of suburbia are overwhelming in the way he reduces the common, banal experience of millions of people to something so rich. Who would think that lawn sprinklers or swimming pools would make interesting imagery? In the hands of a master such as David Hockney these simple things become art.
William Fields
 
Ron Cohen: Having seen a limited amount of his work I find that I am constantly searching for more. His paintings are mystical, magical, and strangly comforting. I look at them often.




Previous Features
  December, 1999
Poll: Who is Producing the Most Interesting Art Today? (Part I)
  November, 1999
The Louvre Museum
Artist: Albrecht Dürer
Museum: The Louvre
Book: Paintings in the Louvre
Print: Study of a Horse's Head, by Pisanello
  October, 1999
Impressionism
Artist: Claude Monet
Museum: North Carolina Museum of Art
Exhibit: Monet: O Mestre do Impressionismo
Book: Impressionists in Winter: Effets de Neige
Print: Nympheas avec Effets de Nuage, by Claude Monet
  September, 1999
Optical Art
Artist: M.C. Escher
Museum: The Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio
Exhibit: Trompe l'oeil: The Art of Deception
Book: M.C. Escher: His Life and Complete Graphic Work
Print: Movement In Squares, by Bridget Riley
  August, 1999
Animals in Art
Artist: Antoine-Louis Barye
Museum: National Museum of Wildlife Art, Jackson Hole, Wyoming
Exhibit: PBS: American Visions
Book: Natural Worlds, by Robert Bateman
Print: A la Bodiniere, by Théophile Steinlen
  July, 1999
Surrealism
Artist: Odd Nerdrum
Museum: Museum of Modern Art, New York
Exhibit: Virtuo Official Magritte Site
Book: Mystery of Magritte CD-ROM
Print: Santiago El Grande, by Salvador Dalí
  June, 1999
Sculpture
Artist: Audrey Flack
Museum: Carol Gerten's Fine Art
Exhibit: Michael Lucero: Sculpture 1976-1995
Book: Anish Kapoor
Print: Cupid And Psyche, by Antonio Canova
  May, 1999
Women in the Arts
Artist: Georgia O'Keeffe
Museum: National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington D.C.
Exhibit: Jenny Holzer: Please Change Beliefs
Book: Cindy Sherman: Retrospective
Print: Self-Portrait with Monkeys, by Frida Kahlo
  April, 1999
The Golden Age of Illustration
Artist: Maxfield Parrish
Museum: Fine Arts Museums Of San Francisco
Exhibit: Treasure Island and Robinson Crusoe online
Books: Treasure Island and Robinson Crusoe
Print: Cinderella (Enchantment), by Maxfield Parrish
  March, 1999
Vincent van Gogh
Artist: Vincent van Gogh
Museum: Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam
Exhibit: The Vincent van Gogh Information Gallery
Book: Van Gogh's Van Goghs
Print: Terrasse de Cafe
  February, 1999
Great Art
Artist: Leonardo da Vinci
Museum: The State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia
Exhibit: John Singleton Copley: Watson and the Shark
Book: The Sistine Chapel: A Glorious Restoration
Print: L'Astronomia, by Raphael