No one tradition really held sway in the pluralistic 70’s zeitgeist while I was at Cooper Union. That doesn’t mean just anything went either. Many important things were happening and many more were just about to as the 1980’s drew near. Art making is an organic process like any other. Out of a need comes the work and to put it a little simplistically: painters paint. Fashion, trends, perseverance, ambition and timing does the rest, or doesn’t, in the short term.
When I was an assistant to the painter Wolf Kahn my senior year I was fortunate to see, first hand, an artist of integrity with a strong work ethic. Maybe I felt his paintings to be a bit stodgy in spite of there somewhat conservative all American Impressionist landscape beauty. One of the things I came away with after having worked for him was a sense of what it really means to be a painter full time, and the sacrifices involved (of course my father as a musician was similar but this was different). He told me once how he had been invited to a rich collector’s place out on some island somewhere and went snorkeling along with other fun leisurely activities. He envied the collector’s life style saying he can’t really afford to live like that. Toiling away instead in his Broadway studio seemingly nonstop, cranking out work. He was at the same time very appreciative I’m sure that he had a market and demand for his paintings and pastels. He was also feeling a little down because he had been let go as a teacher at Cooper. Not enough students were taking his class. I overheard Emily Mason, his wife who is also a painter, consoling him tenderly saying that it was a bunch of crumby students’ faults not his. His way of painting in that rather soft Bonnard like way even had an influence on me. I liked his sense of edge control that was very different from what I had been used to. It found its way into my work for awhile and helped loosen me up.
My four years of study at Cooper Union were coming to a close. The class of 1980. Ellen Berkenblit, Teo Mieczkowski and I would have our senior year three person show in the gallery of the main building on the second floor where these events were held. Teo had some beautiful large scale abstract paintings while Ellen showed her customary small scale, quirky, personal works. As for myself I exhibited three large figurative/abstract paintings which owed a great debt to DeKooning and Pollock but with my own subject matter. So here we were, about to graduate and go out into the real world.
It’s hard to put into words how I feel about what those years at Cooper meant to me now. Suffice it to say I am forever grateful to have had the opportunity to study with so many fine teachers, to have met so many talented students, to have made so many great and lasting friendships there. It was the opportunity of a life time to say the least.
Rick Prol 