The can on the right has a pierced top two triangular cuts have been left by a beer-can opener. It requires you to become a close observer of minute variations and ponder the conundrum of how-are-these-two-images-different? (Hint: study the brush strokes.)Īt first glance, the two cans of Ballantine ale that stand side by side in Johns well-known sculpture Painted Bronze (1960) which was just acquired by the Whitney look anonymous and interchangeable. Two Flags (1962), for instance, is a radiant, 8-foot-tall painting of two American flags stacked vertically.
And its essence lies in his use of doubles: twinned images that resemble each other but are not identical. Yet the dramatic and much-told story of his influence on other artists has in some ways overshadowed his work, which is about patience, process and interiority, about constructing and expanding a visual language over six decades. Johns is best known as the radical figure whose paintings of flags and targets hastened the end of abstract expressionism in the ∥0s and helped hatch pop art in the ∦0s. The shows were cleverly designed as mirror versions of each other, and as such go to the heart of Johns work, which abounds with doubles and doppelgängers. It comes after acclaimed exhibitions at Londons Royal Academy (2017), the Broad Museum in Los Angeles (2018), and the Matthew Marks Gallery in Manhattan (2019).īut Mind/Mirror stands to offer a revelatory approach to Johns work by virtue of its two-venue structure, which is not just a vehicle for more-is-more, Barnum-like showmanship. Some might question the necessity of honoring Americas most famous living artist in a megashow spanning the Northeast Corridor, to use an Amtrak term. Johns turned 91 and kept making art, maintaining an Olympian detachment from the preparations.Īsked about the show, Johns said only, I dont want to be quoted. In the interim, the two curators developed differing ideas about the show and sometimes clashed. Planned to celebrate Johns 90th birthday, the show was postponed a year to await the end of the COVID lockdown. 29, Jasper Johns: Mind/Mirror, the largest-ever exhibition devoted to his work, will open simultaneously at the Whitney Museum of American Art in Manhattan and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. He is something of a solitary creature, a man who is eloquent in his silences and prefers to skip his own openings. I had started writing a biography of the artist a few years earlier, and was aware of his love of trees and plants, which probably bring him more satisfaction than social interactions do. In a summer when so much of the world was still reeling from COVID-19, it was heartening to think that at least a towering oak might be saved. The moths gray wings fluttered wildly as they tumbled to the ground. Johns, who was dressed neatly in khaki pants, a turquoise linen shirt and a pair of heavy yellow gloves, was using his hands to scrape the eggs off the bark. An infestation of gypsy moths was visible on the trunk gauzy deposits of tiny eggs were imperiling the trees health. On a recent Saturday morning, I arrived at the stone house in Sharon, Connecticut, and found Jasper Johns outside on the lawn, tending to a massive oak tree.
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