art Archives - Jerry Jazz Musician

The art of John Allinson

In his description of Welsh painter John Allinson’s work “House of Dreams” – a mural in progress “celebrating a viewpoint of entertainment as an art form” that will eventually be 1000 feet wide – the art critic Rex Harley wrote that “a host of artists and entertainers emerge from a swirl of colours, in the same way that their counterparts stepped out from the stream of history to entertain and enrich our lives.”

This is also an apt view of Allinson’s prolific and noteworthy interpretations of jazz ensembles. His work evokes appropriate nostalgia and sentimentality while expressing passion for the culture of jazz music by

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May 18th, 2018

Masters of Jazz Photography: Paul Hoeffler

Photographer Paul Hoeffler, who studied with the likes of Ansel Adams, Alfred Eisenstadt, and Nancy Newhall, discovered an interest in photographing jazz musicians through his regular attendance at Rochester, New York jazz clubs the Pythodd, the Ridgecrest Inn, the Auditorium Theater, the Eastman Theater, and the University of Rochester auditoriums. He cites Louis Armstrong as an early inspiration, and he subsequently photographed Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Billie Holiday, Chet Baker, Dave Brubeck and a variety of others during their tours through

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March 17th, 2018

“All is Heard in Painting” — the art of Jazzamoart

The visual artist Jazzamoart of Guanajuato, Mexico has long enticed serious jazz collectors with his uncommon, audacious, and joyful paintings. Possibly the most important expressionist artist interpreting jazz, the critic Antonio Rodriguez wrote that Jazzamoart’s paintings “are reminiscent of Jackson Pollock’s style and the expression takes from the horrorific elements of Willem de Kooning’s work,” while Jose Luis Cuevas describes it as “if he were a mad jazz dancer who discovers the origins of the earth every time his toe dips into it.” His color-filled work includes abstract interpretations of musicians and the settings they perform in. The musicians often wear masks which symbolize, according to the artist, “the multiplicity of human identity, that life is improvisation and invention.”

Examples of his work follow…

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November 28th, 2017

Nancy Ostrovsky — performance artist inspired by jazz music

Jazz music has long been inspiration for artists, poets, and writers (Romare Bearden, Jack Kerouac and Langston Hughes are some obvious examples)…For more contemporary evidence, check out these remarkable videos featuring performance artist Nancy Ostrovsky, who creates wondrous paintings while accompanied by 1) the Roswell Rudd Trio, 2) saxophonist Patrick Cress, 3) saxophonist Stan Strickland, and 4) by a

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September 13th, 2017

“Jazz in the Schools”

Many thanks to Doug Ramsey, honored jazz journalist and publisher of the blog Rifftides, who during his visit to Portland to cover the PDX Jazz Festival, took the time to meet with me and learn about the “Jazz in the Schools” program we instituted at PDX Jazz. You can read his report and get information about the program by clicking here.

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February 22nd, 2017

The art of Miles Davis

A Daily Beast post worth a visit features several paintings by Miles Davis, all of which were included in Steve Gutterman’s 2013 book, Miles Davis: The Collected Artwork. The page provides an efficient snapshot of the

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November 8th, 2016

“Bop of Cuevano” — a painting by Jazzamoart

The Mexican visual artist Jazzamoart has long been a fascinating artistic interpreter of jazz music. This painting, “Bop of Cuevano,” is an example of his

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July 14th, 2015

Masters of Jazz Photography — Jim Marshall

The great improvisational American jazz musicians of the mid-20th century inspired a generation of photographers to develop a looser, moodier style of visual expression. That evocative approach is on striking display in The Jazz Image: Masters of Jazz Photography. Covering six decades of performers from Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington to John Coltrane and Miles Davis this unique collection is as much a comprehensive catalogue of jazz greats as it is a salute to the photographers who captured them.

Jerry Jazz Musician presents a number of editions of “Master of Jazz Photography,” featuring a work by one of the photographers featured in The Jazz Image

This edition: Jim Marshall

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February 28th, 2014

Bix Beiderbecke, Miles Davis among the National Portrait Gallery’s “American Cool” exhibition

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery in Washington is currently curating an exhibit called “American Cool,” which features 100 photographs of iconic Americans who, according to the institution, “have contributed an original artistic vision to American culture and are symbolic figures of their time.”

Artists like Bessie Smith, Bix Beiderbecke, Bert Williams, and Willie “the Lion” Smith and writers like Ernest Hemingway and Zora Neale Hurston are included in the “Roots of Cool” category, while Lester Young, Frank Sinatra, Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, and Thelonious Monk are among those deemed to be part of the “Birth of the Cool” group.

What were the determining factors in what constitutes “cool” and who has enough of it to be featured in the exhibition? According to Kim Sajet, director of the National Portrait Gallery, “‘American Cool’ is about America’s greatest cultural export—cool—and who embodies it. The show offers an opportunity

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February 12th, 2014

The Art of Romare Bearden

Romare Bearden (1911 – 1988) was one of America’s great artistic innovators,blazing his own trail in a time of turbulent cultural change. Whilehis work offers an invaluable view of mid-twentieth-century African-Americanexperience, it has also come to occupy a significant place in the wider historyof American art and speaks to the universal concerns of artists everywhere.

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February 10th, 2013