Philip Pearlstein; The 2011 Gold Medal Award
A forum posted by Matthew D. Innis which celebrates excellence in Representational Art - past, present, and future.
Vice Chairman Edward Jonas presenting the Gold Medal to Philip Pearlstein.
Philip Pearlstein was the next person to be honored by the Portrait Society, who bestowed upon the icon the 2011 Gold Medal Award for his career in the arts. Pearlstein was an artist who, in the 1960's, was a rarity, painting portraits from life while those around him were mired in the prevalent movement of the day, Abstract Expressionism. His representational style, with its unusual cropping, perspective, and compositions paved the way for modern figurative art.
What was most enjoyable about Pearlstein's presentation was his intelligence, humility, and humor when it came to his own work. Two stories he told were particularly funny, and as is typical of portrait artists, revolved around poorly received commissions. The first story Pearlstein related was about a his portrait of Philadelphia's John Cardinal Krol, who hated Pearlstein's painting so much, that the good Cardnal promised not to keep the finished work, but to donate it to his favorite charity - The Society for the Blind. In the second humorous story, Pearlstein had painted the portrait of a female, university president. She loved the painting, but a militant, campus, women's rights group, stole the painting from the school deeming the work an offense to all women kind. Eventually it was returned, but was soon kidnapped by another campus group who refused to return the painting until their demands were met. When the university would not give in, the kidnappers began taking pictures of the painting in various locations, including a dumpster. They too eventually returned the portrait, but not unscarred; across its back was a poem written with a SharpieŽ marker and which will eventually bleed through to the front of the painting in time.
Click Here to return to the News page.