John Alexander
(b. 1945) John Alexander is a world renowned artist whose works pays tribute to the rich tradition of painters throughout the history of art. His early works were primarily semi-abstract landscapes, and later, dense, expressionistic paintings. His more recent drawings and paintings include birds, plants and animals (often those native to Texas and the Southern Gulf Coast states), and satirical works of characters and masked figures representing the most dysfunctional members of society.
Alexander grew up in Beaumont where his only exposure to art as was a small collection of art books owned by his family. He had an innate gift for drawing and painting that was encouraged by his mother. His father’s contribution to his art career was to take him on frequent camping and fishing excursions in the swamps and bayous of southeast Texas. The East Texas landscape became Alexander’s inspiration and has provided lifelong visual references throughout his career.
When Alexander’s father passed away in 1965, Lamar painting professor Jerry Newman became a mentor to the freshman art student pushing him to hone his skills in drawing and painting and introducing him to art history. Though Alexander learned to draw by copying works of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he didn’t see art in a museum setting until he was 21 years old and had an opportunity to visit the Art Institute of Chicago.
Alexander received an art degree from Lamar in 1968 and an MFA degree from SMU. He taught at the University of Houston in the 70s, along with sculptor James Surls. When his career began taking off with exhibits at Meredith Long Gallery and the Contemporary Art Museum in Houston, he moved to New York to expand his opportunities in the art world. Alexander still lives in New York, but retains his fondness for Southeast Texas. He enjoys returning at every opportunity, particularly to visit Lamar and to see the birds and wildlife at Cattail Marsh and High Island.
Alexander was awarded a Fellowship by the National Endowment for the Arts in 1981 and another by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Memorial Foundation in 1984. He had a major retrospective at the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston in 2007. His work is included in the permanent collections of the The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York; the Smithsonian American Art Museum in D.C.; the Museum of Contemporary Art in L.A.; the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston; the Dallas Museum of Art; and the Art Museum of Southeast Texas in Beaumont. In 2015, the painting studio in the Lamar art building was dedicated as The John Alexander Painting Studio.
Art on Campus
Night Garden
Year: 2005Medium: Oil on Canvas
Location: Dishman Art Musuem (Permanent Collection)
Davy Jones Locker
Year: 1987Medium: Oil on Canvas
Location: Rudy Williams Bldg, John Gray Center, Ste. 122
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Douglas Stuart.
This massive 90” x 100” expressionistic painting, filled with an assortment of fish, sea grasses and a skull, is the largest of several undersea works Alexander painted in the late 1980s. The Smithsonian has one of the others.
Searching for Evangeline
Year: 2018Medium: Oil on Canvas
Location: Science and Technology Building North Lobby
Waiting for Godot
Year: 1987Medium: Oil on Canvas
Location: Rudy Williams Bldg., John Gray Center Hallway
Waiting for Godot was painted in the late 80s when Alexander was transitioning in style from somewhat abstract work back to landscapes. He began incorporating more figures into his paintings and adding images that would become favorite recurring themes in later work - skulls, skeletons, chains, crowned and haloed heads, staring eyes, faces, masks. He covered every inch of these canvases with figures, landscape elements and symbols. The paintings are tension-filled with swashes of vibrant color and sharp angles of spiky plants and trees.
This painting evokes memories of Alexander’s childhood spent exploring nature in Southeast Texas and Louisiana. Popular ghost stories included tales of voodoo practitioners and headless people living in the swamps. Alexander captures that sense of mystery and fear by placing striped tribal masks peering out from the trees and foliage. The staring figures lure the viewer into the scene and encourage active participation with the painting.
Though this is obviously a landscape, fish are swimming throughout, both high and low, perhaps a nod to Alexander’s scuba diving experience captured in Davy Jones Locker. To add additional humor, the head of his cat Mr. Friend peaks out of a tree on the left side of the canvas. In the 1985 publication Fresh Paint, from an exhibition curated by Barbara Rose and Susie Kalil, Alexander is quoted as saying, “Sometimes I want my paintings to scare people and make them laugh and still be beautiful.”
Amazonas
Year: 1987Medium: Oil on Canvas
Location: Rudy Williams Bldg., John Gray Center Hallway
This painting, originally titled Green Landscape, was later changed to Amazonas, which means Amazon in Spanish. Either name is fitting for an image with such a tropical feel, yet a reference to the Amazon brings to mind a more untamed and treacherous setting. The palm branches in various shades of green and red create a sense of a dense, impenetrable jungle. Though beautiful, the scene is anything but calm with slashes of brilliant color splayed across the surface – reds, yellows, blues, blacks. The angles, lines and colors keep the viewer’s eye roving restlessly around the canvas. Barely visible in the center right is a linked chain attached to a hidden shape, perhaps a box or treasure chest nestled within the undergrowth.
Green with Envy
Year: 2010
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Location: Rudy Williams Bldg., John Gray Center, Ste.122
Gift of Krista and Mike Dumas
Green with Envy is the first satirical painting of Alexander’s to join Lamar’s growing collection of the artist’s work. This is one of several paintings referencing Hieronymus Bosch’s 15th Century oil on panel “Ship of Fools.” The imagery in both works is a social commentary on people in leadership who take advantage of their positions to the detriment of those around them. In Bosch’s version, a drifting raft holds ten inpiduals happily eating and drinking as two others stranded in the water beg for rescue. Alexander’s ship contains even more characters, all oblivious to the water pouring into their listing boat. Only the black cat staring directly at the viewer seems aware and afraid.
Three of the men are in military uniform, one is in a business suit complete with a red power tie, and yet another appears to be a cardinal identifiable by his scarlet zucchetto. Five of the figures wear the signature Alexander beaked mask, a tactic he turned to after being criticized for painting recognizable satirical portraits in the 1980s. Though some characters have a vague resemblance to historical figures like Stalin or Napoleon, the artist’s intention is to depict the authoritarianism and abuse of power those types of people represent rather than specific inpiduals.
While the subject matter and imagery are difficult, the painting also shows Alexander’s immense sense of humor. For instance, the figure with the bulbous red nose and clown makeup stands totally erect having lost not a single drop of his martini despite the rocking boat and choppy sea. The captain at the top of the pack wields a sharp knife ready to attack though the only visible adversaries are the waves and the wide-eyed comical looking fish jumping around the boat.
Alexander has packed this painting with his personal vocabulary of symbols. The dollar bills are meant to represent greed, uniforms - authoritarianism, the dunce cap - idiocy, and the haloed figure – religiosity. The open-mouthed green monkey-like figure at the bottom of the boat is likely intended to represent the human psyche. Again borrowing from Bosch, the owl represents bad luck - something this boatload of miscreants is in full supply of.
Two Untitled Paintings
Year: 1970
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Location: Rudy Williams Bldg., John Gray Center Hallway
Gift of Linda McDill
These two early works by John Alexander were painted around the time he was enrolled in graduate school at SMU. Though they bear little resemblance to his later work, the rendering of tree limbs is an indicator of what is to come. Likewise, the dark palette may seem unusual for those familiar with current work but is quite characteristic of the artist’s early paintings. Alexander has experienced a commercially successful career since his first exhibition with Meredith Long Gallery in Houston in 1970. These paintings are effective examples to show how his style has progressed from formulaic subject matter and relatively controlled brushwork to the dynamic and energetic works he continues to create today.
Íæż½ã½ã alumnus John Alexander talks about what inspires his art, some of his art work that is at Íæż½ã½ã, and about his time as a student.