Kenneth Callahan
Kenneth Callahan
It was just a matter of information . But I couldn ’ t avoid giving an opinion , and as a result of that , some of the national art magazines would get caught up with this and so they ’ d occasionally ask me to do things .” He also wrote for Art News , where one of his articles caused a rift with Mark Tobey . His editor asked him to write about the Northwest School , but “ not to devote a lot of attention to Mark and Morris because everybody already knows about them .” Morris Graves didn ’ t seem to mind being played down , but Tobey ’ s ego was bruised . Guy Anderson , who sympathized with Tobey , stopped speaking to Callahan .
The article also led to Callahan ’ s dismissal from the Seattle Art Museum . His hands were full anyway . He received a Guggenheim fellowship in 1954 . He had New York representation at the Maynard Walker Gallery , and solo shows at the Brooklyn Museum , the Portland Art Museum , the Metropolitan , the Whitney , the Guggenheim , the Henry , and many other great museums — but never the one where he worked for 20 years . He also taught at the University of Southern California , Syracuse University , Penn State , and Boston University , but never at his alma mater , the University of Washington .
Callahan ’ s paintings are distinguished by vigorous , even angry , brushwork , and colors that tend to the warm end of the spectrum . Like the other three ,
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