Cleveland Museum of Art's Charles Burchfield Exhibition Part II

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Charles Burchfield, Chestnut Trees, ink wash drawing, 1920
Cleveland Museum of Art


Sharing a few more highlights from Cleveland Museum of Art's just concluded exhibition Charles Burchfield: The Ohio Landscapes 1915-1920 (Part 1 of my appreciation of the show is available here ).

Two of my personal favorites were these two ink wash drawings (above and below). One of the things that excites me about Burchfield's work is how he can suggest the feeling of full color when he in reality he often limited himself to just yellows and grays. In these monochrome wash drawings we see the expressiveness of just resonant tones of dark and light.


Charles Burchfield, Apple Orchard,  ink wash drawing, 1920
Cleveland Museum of Art



Artists have the job of noticing things of importance others have overlooked and calling people back to take a second look. We've all seen dandelion seeds blown by the wind. Yet I don't think any other artist ever attempted to make a painting about such an ephemeral movement as his watercolor below.


Charles Burchfield, Drifting Dandelion Seeds, watercolor
May 1916, Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo, NY


My wife and traveled to Salem, OH to explore Burchfield's family home. As a young artist he painted dozens of watercolors from the front porch and looking out all of its windows. These two watercolors loaned from the Burchfield Penney Art Center's collection to me look like were made from some of the home's second floor bedroom windows.



Charles Burchfield, Left: Afterglow, watercolor, 1916
Right: Untitled (Red House), watercolor, May 31, 1916
Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo, NY





Signage for the exhibition inside one of the Museum's galleries.



A strength of Burchfield as a painter was he used the landscape as a metaphor for the whole range of human emotions from celebrating brilliant sunlight to plumbing the depths of things that touch us as sorrowful or fearful. A little bit of creepiness can be a lot of fun.


Charles Burchfield, Memory of a Dream, watercolor, 
March 15, 1919, Burchfield Penney Art Center, 
Buffalo, NY




Charles Burchfield, White Violets and Coal Mine,
watercolor, 1918, Cleveland Museum of Art

I particularly liked the way Britany Salsbury, the exhibition's curator, hung together his paintings of the abandoned coal mines that were common in the Salem area in his day. They point to Burchfield's concern for how even 19th century industry had scarred the earth. From both his art and his extensive journals we know he was one of our early environmentalists.



Charles Burchfield, Deserted Miner's Home, April 27, 1918,
watercolor,  Burchfield Penney Art Center

Burchfield was perhaps unconsciously drawn to these openings as they suggested peering deep into previously unknown and uncharted realms. In his journal he wrote of them having "dark and gloomy depths...a luring mysteriousness." Much of his strength as a painter I believe came how he let his unconscious side play an active role in his creations. It allowed him to often convey a profound moodiness.




Philip Koch, Coke Ovens, Leetonia, vine charcoal,
12 x 9 inches, 2017, Allen Memorial Art Museum, 
Oberlin, OH


The day after I visited the show at the Cleveland Museum I drove west to visit my alma mater's Allen Memorial Art Museum in Oberlin, OH. While there I showed a selection of my works to the Allen's Director, Andria Derstine. Among them was a the above drawing I had made on location just outside Burchfield's hometown of the abandoned coke ovens that are preserved in Leetonia, OH. 

 The Allen Museum purchased the piece for its permanent collection. In my first semester at Oberlin I had slowly fallen in love with that museum. Totally hooked I realized I needed drop my intended Sociology major and instead go down the road to becoming a painter. Seeing my slightly "creepy" drawing in the Allen's collection I feel something has come full circle.

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