Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
Summary:
An interview of Claire Falkenstein conducted 1995 Mar.2-21, by Paul Karlstrom, for the Archives of American Art, Women in the Arts in Southern California Oral History Project, in Falkenstein's studio, Venice, Calif.
Falkenstein discusses the evolution of her work; the benefit of being alone to her personal and artistic growth; her "vocabulary of art" which she created while at the University of California at Berkeley; her largest commission at St. Basil's Cathedral in Los Angeles and her views on religion and art; the influence on her of George Lusk, a visiting artist and philosopher from Paris; studying the nude figure and how it taught her personal expression; her family background and introduction to art; teaching in the Bay Area at the California School of Fine Arts; her friendships with other artists there such as Clyfford Still; her reasons for leaving the Bay Area to go to Paris; and meeting Michel Tapie and the Stadler Gallery group. She recalls Karl Appel, Martha Jackson, Clyfford Still, Sam Francis, and others.
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Claire Falkenstein, 1995 Mar. 2-21. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Additional Forms:
Transcript available online.
Funding:
Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service.
Biography Note:
Claire Falkenstein (1908-1997) was a sculptor of Venice, Calif.
Language Note:
English .
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators. Funding for this interview was provided by the Margery and Harry Kahn Philanthropic Fund of the Jewish Communal Fund of New York.
Location Note:
Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, 750 9th St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20001