Will Barnet, Innovative Artist, Remembered
- November 16, 2012 01:44
Will Barnet, printmaker and visionary artist with a productive 80-year-long career, passed away at age 101 on Nov. 13 in New York City. He is best known for his stylized realism in simple and austere portraits of family, friends, and animals.
He had his first New York museum retrospective at age 100 last year. "Will Barnet at 100" was on view at the National Academy Museum from September 16 to December 31, 2011.
In February, President Obama awarded Barnet the National Medal of Arts.
Barnet has work in virtually every major museum in the United States, and his figurative and abstract paintings and prints have significantly advanced the fine arts.
During a career that has spanned over 80 years, Barnet has been a printer for major artists, including Louise Bourgeois, and a teacher of Eva Hesse, James Rosenquist, and Tom Wesselmann.
Barnet was born in Beverly, Mass., in 1911. He moved to New York in 1930 and embarked on an 80-year career as an artist, printmaker, and instructor. Barnet taught at the Art Students League (1941-1979) and Cooper Union (1945-1967) in New York and at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (1967-1992) in addition to shorter term appointments.
100x100_c.jpg "Two Nayarit (Mexico) seated musician figures with instruments, reddish ceramic with pigments and manganese, 200 BCE to 200 CE. Sizes: Larger figure 15¼in x 8in, smaller figure 15in x 10in. Estimate: $4,000-$6,000")
![Peter Paul Rubens (Flemish, 1577–1640), After Titian (Tiziano Vecelli) (Italian [Venetian], c. 1488–1576), Rape of Europa, 1628–29. Oil on canvas, 71 7/8 x 79 3/8 in.](/images/c/e2/2e/Jan20_Rape_of_Europa100x100_c.jpg "Peter Paul Rubens (Flemish, 1577–1640), After Titian (Tiziano Vecelli) (Italian [Venetian], c. 1488–1576), Rape of Europa, 1628–29. Oil on canvas, 71 7/8 x 79 3/8 in.")
