ARTIST NAME: James Turrell Find
out how much an artwork of James Turrell is worth |
Auction Results and Indebt Information on James Turrell Art
James Turrell Biography: |
James
Turrell was born in Los Angeles in 1943. His undergraduate studies at
Pomona College focused on psychology and mathematics; only later, in
graduate school, did he pursue art. He received an MFA in art from the
Claremont Graduate School in Claremont, California. Turrell’s work
involves explorations in light and space that speak to viewers without
words, impacting the eye, body, and mind with the force of a
spiritual awakening. “I want to create an atmosphere that can be
consciously plumbed with seeing,” says the artist, “like the wordless
thought that comes from looking in a fire.” Informed by his studies in
perceptual psychology and optical
illusions, Turrell’s work allows us to see ourselves “seeing.”
Whether harnessing the light at sunset or transforming the glow of a
television set into a fluctuating portal, Turrell’s art places viewers
in a realm of pure experience. Situated near the Grand Canyon and
Arizona’s Painted Desert is Roden Crater, an extinct volcano the artist
has been transforming into a celestial observatory for the past thirty
years. Working with cosmological phenomena that have interested man
since the dawn of civilization and have prompted responses such as
Stonehenge and the Mayan calendar, Turrell’s crater brings the heavens
down to earth, linking the actions of people with the movements of
planets and distant galaxies. His fascination with the phenomena of
light is ultimately connected to a very personal, inward search for
mankind’s place in the universe. Influenced by his Quaker faith, which
he characterizes as having a “straightforward, strict presentation of
the sublime,” Turrell’s art prompts greater self-awareness through a
similar discipline of silent contemplation, patience, and meditation.
His ethereal
installations enlist the common properties of light to communicate
feelings of transcendence and the Divine. The recipient of several
prestigious awards such as Guggenheim and MacArthur Fellowships, Turrell
lives in Arizona. -Source: PBS |
James Turrell Books