"Block painting" is a technique developed by Charles Smith which combines oil painting and woodcut printing. See inscription for more information.
Signed Charles Smith in graphite lower right
Inscribed in graphite lower right: 20.00. Printed on front of mat:
Charles Smith's Zoo
Kangaroos stop to chat, penguins listen politely to a speech by their leader, while five kiwi-like birds march single file in Charles Smith's Zoo. One observer noted that Mr. Smith's creatures always seem to be "traveling someplace, plotting something or gloating over a special secret." In a humorous but gentle way these creatures mirror ourselves and our world.
These spirited compositions by Charles Smith are called "block paintings," a technique the artist developed in the 1930s after years of making woodcuts and oil paintings. Simple and direct, this technique enables natural forms to be reduced to their basic elements. For instance, in Three with Horns, longhorn steer composed simply of a rectangle, triangles and ovals stare warily at the viewer. Smith's work reveals a keen understanding of the animal's behavior, an insight he developed while growing up in rural Virginia.
Born near Waynesboro in 1893, Charles Smith worked with his father carving wooden designs for a foundry that made cast iron doors for wood stoves. He carved his patterns, of white pine, into large abstract designs. Smith once said that his early experiences in design and woodworking were the foundation of his interest in art, in particular the woodcut.
One of the oldest methods for making more than one copy of a picture, the woodcut process involves carving a design into the surface of a wooden block. The surface is inked, and when a sheet of paper is pressed against the block, the image is transferred from the flat, uncarved areas to the paper.
Because block printing lends itself to simple images and bold contrast, making woodcuts made Smith more aware of abstract form. When he began to think about using abstract forms in his oil paintings in the 1930s, artists everywhere were experimenting with new forms as they tried to convey the changing pace of twentieth-century life. Like the early Cubists, Smith reduced the forms of his subjects to geometric shapes and used softened colors in order to focus on the essential nature of the object.
While Smith was teaching art at Bennington College in Vermont (1936-1946), he combined his love of printmaking and oil painting into one new process: block painting. This process, which Smith described as "painting with blocks rather than brushes," allowed him to control texture and color by the amount of ink applied to each block-shape in the composition and to vary the pressure used during printing. This process is also a form of monotype, meaning that only one impression of each print can be made.
Smith would develop a rough drawing, then selected wooden blocks that matched the sketch. Colored printing inks were next applied to the surfaces of the wooden shapes. Each block was stamped by hand or passed through a small press. As in the woodcut process, the image was transferred from the block to the paper. He repeated this procedure, block by block, until the composition was completed.
An animal could be made using just a few blocks: one for the head, one for the body, and others for the ears and tail. More detailed compositions required dozens of blocks. Over the years Mr. Smith carved and collected about 700 wooden blocks of varying sizes and shapes. Mindful that the slightest curve or angle could represent fear, surprise, or happiness, Smith would carefully select from his collection just the right shaped block to make his creatures come alive.
TEAMS
Traveling Exhibition and Media Services of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond
John Barton Payne Fund
"Charles Smith's Zoo", Virginia Museum Traveling Exhibition, 1954- ca. 2008 (exact retirement date of statewide exhibition pending further research)
©artist or artist’s estate
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