Paintings
As his musical career flourished, Mellencamp began to paint earnestly in the 1980s with an early affinity for portraiture influenced by the works of Otto Dix and Max Beckmann.
His kinship with the German Expressionism of the early Twentieth century, with its existential focus on the human condition, serves as the foundation for the development of Mellencamp’s “oeuvre”.
His large-scale oil portraits and mixed-media pieces document America’s heart and soul, revealing unsettling but beautiful truths with a kind of anti-establishment frown, with a rich sense of narrative. Like his music, Mellencamp’s paintings are carefully composed through the structural requirements of harmony, rhythm and order, and is thematically in line with the small-town, earnest voice of the heartland.
Mellencamp art collection include Chaim Soutine, Max Beckmann, Jack Levine, Walt Kuhn, among others.
He has exhibited his work in galleries and museums across the United States, including: The Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio; the Tennessee State Museum, Nashville; The Museum of Art – Deland, Florida; ACA Galleries, New York and the Morris Museum of Art, Augusta, Georgia.
For more of John's fine art and his gallery in Bloomington, Indiana, check out his site Antiquatedfinearts.com.
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