Artist of the Month: W.C. Hemming

Student News | Tuesday, September 11, 2018

The Library welcomes returning artist, W.C. Hemming to its main gallery on the 2nd floor. Hemming indicates that his art is painted in the German Expressionist style, using bold colors and unusual brushwork.

It is also in the form of the ‘Boston Expressionism” – 1940 - 1956. The Boston Expressionism is mainly shown in the work of Hyman Bloom, Karl Zerbe, and Jack Levine. It features dark humor, social commentary, figurative art, and bold colors. The current show displays both figurative work and landscape of recent years.

Included is a quasi-gothic approach to nature and vivid colors. Examples of this sort of expressionism can be seen in pictures of “Martian Sunrise”, portraits of “Warren Oats”, and “Hawking”. This combines the late scientist image with his theory on a blackboard. He usually uses icons that can easily combine familiarity with a theme.

Hemming states, “In high school, I had favorite artists that I enjoyed, so I studied the works of Jack Levine Charles Bragg, and Thomas Nast. Jack Levine did such masterpieces as “Gangster’s Funeral” and group figures of political, and very dark humor”.

The late Charles Bragg was a master of expression with silly and profound scenes of ordinary, human life; making life a huge insane asylum. These expressionist painters influenced him over fifty years. Trained at the Columbus Arts and Design, as well as the Ohio State University. Mr. Hemming’s first one-man show was at the Columbus Cultural Arts Center, then at Columbus City Hall.  In 2003, he showed 15 paintings in the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona. This exhibit will remain in the library’s 2nd-floor gallery through September 30.

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