When you are the son of one America's most famous painters and the grandson of one of America's finest illustrators, there may be a lot of pressure for you to also produce great works of art. James Browning Wyeth has certainly lived up to the challenge.

Not every talented artist is lucky enough to have a show exhibiting only their own work in their lifetime, but Jamie was twenty years old when his first one-person show opened in New York. His first retrospective was held before he turned thirty years old in Omaha, Nebraska.

Growing up in the Wyeth Household

Jamie Wyeth was born on July 6, 1946 in Wilmington, Delaware, near the Pennsylvania countryside where his father was raised. Like his father, Jamie was schooled at home. Andrew Wyeth attended school until third grade; his son quit school in the sixth grade. As a result, both father and son were able to focus on art through regular private art lessons.

Jamie would learn about history and literature in the mornings, and in the afternoons, he would learn the fundamentals of art from his aunt Carolyn. These private lessons consisted of drawing precise depictions of accurate spheres and cubes, an exercise that bored the young Jamie Wyeth, although he understood why such exercises were important.

Once Jamie had mastered these techniques, he began painting with his father. Careful to encourage Jamie's own style of painting, Andrew Wyeth did not teach Jamie new techniques based on his own vision, but offered only constructive criticism, often remarking, "Watch that form." In fact, Jamie Wyeth decided early on that he was more a fan of oil paints than the egg tempera his father preferred, a medium he thought was too dry.

Wyeth's Early Works

When Jamie Wyeth moved to New York City in 1963, he became acquainted with a Russian anatomist. Wanting to fully understand the human body so that his technique would be even more accurate, Wyeth spent some time at a morgue, where he would dissect and sketch different parts of the body from corpses.

He soon became known for his skillfully executed portraits. His Draft Age, depicting a defiant young man clad in black leather during the Vietnam era, brought him acclaim as a portraitist.

	James Wyeth Draft Age, 1965 Oil on canvas, 36" x 30" Private collection
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In 1966, he joined the U.S. Air Corps Reserve. Luckily, in between trainings, he was able to continue creating art. In the battalion hall, he painted a large mural. Unfortunately, this mural was censored because it depicted skeletons in uniform warning airmen that they will soon die. In its place, a portrait of Delaware's Governor Charles L. Terry was commissioned.

Painting Portraits

Although he is hesitant to do commissioned work, Jamie Wyeth was approached to paint a portrait of John F. Kennedy after he was assassinated. He agreed to paint the portrait, but the response to the end result was not entirely favorable. After watching countless films of Kennedy and sketching studies of John F. Kennedy's brothers, Wyeth saw the former President not merely as a courageous hero, but as a human being wracked with the burden of making important decisions. The final painting, depicting Kennedy biting his nails, reflected this very human side of his personality, and the painting was not allowed to be hung in the White House.

Wyeth has stated that he'll never take on a task like that again. He prefers to engage with those whose portraits he paints, so that the painting is very much a collaborative effort between the artist and his model. He once said of his portraits:

"I really try to become the person I'm painting. A successful portrait isn't about the sitter's physical characteristics-his nose, eyeballs and whatnot-but more the mood and the overall effect. I try not to impose anything of mine on him. I try to get to the point where, if the sitter painted, he'd paint a portrait just the way I'm doing it."¹

Indeed, his paintings of Rudolf Nureyev involved a lot of dialogue between the artist and his model. Sometimes there was too much dialogue. Nureyev was a tough model to paint. It was hard enough for Nureyev to find time to sit and pose for Wyeth. And when he did, he insisted on looking at Wyeth's work at every step to ensure that his likeness was accurate.

Fortunately, Wyeth did not have as much difficulty with pop artist Andy Warhol. The two artists painted each other's portraits for four years in the late 1970s and often visited each other's studios. Wyeth also painted in Warhol's studio The Factory, for one year. Their friendship is reflected in each other's work, evidenced by traces of "popism" in Wyeth's work in the late 1970s to 1980s and in Warhol's paintings of cats and dogs and photographs of pigs, which were also created during that time.

	James Wyeth Portrait of Andy Warhol, 1976 Oil on panel, 30" x 24" Collection of Tennesse Fine Arts Center
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Jamie Wyeth's portraits were not just depictions of people. He is known for his realistic paintings of pigs, chickens, and dogs, animals that he knows and has interacted with. Like his paintings of people, Jamie's animal portraits also reveal the individuality of each model, such as in his Portrait of Pig. Speaking of his model, Wyeth stated:

I got this pig and she lived with us. She was wonderful and fascinating. You work with a pig as long as I do; you get vibrations going back and forth and it's very exciting. ... Portrait painting is the closest thing to acting. You become the person. I certainly became the pig.²

	James Wyeth Portrait of Pig, 1970 Oil on canvas, 48" x 84" Collection of Brandywine River Museum
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The Many Styles of James Wyeth

But Wyeth was not just renowned for his portraits. He has also documented important events in history. At the end of the 1960's, Wyeth recorded the launchings of space probes through a program sponsored by the National Aeronautics Space Administration and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. And in 1974, he sketched courtroom trials and incidents at the Senate during the Watergate developments.

Following the footsteps of his grandfather, Jamie Wyeth also illustrated two children's books. One book, The Stray, was written by his mother, Betsy James Wyeth, and the other, Cabbages and Kings, was written by Elizabeth Seabrook.

Wyeth's 1990's work reflects his inspiration from living on Monhegan, an island off the coast of Maine inhabited by only sixty people. The solitude of the place, its granite cliffs and crashing waves, and its gulls and sheep resulted in paintings of dreamy landscapes, often containing lighthouses, water, animals, and figures, such as in his Lighthouse Dandelions.

Many of the figures in his 1990s work are not painted from life, but are comprised of features form different people, such as his wife Phyllis or young female and male models. His 1996 work, If Once You Have Slept, depicts a young woman deep in thought. Can you guess what she might be thinking? How would you describe the mood of the painting and why would you describe it that way? (Think about the use of light and the way Wyeth depicts movement.)

	James Wyeth If Once You Have Slept on an Island, 1996 Oil on panel, 30" x 36" Owner unknown
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From events in history to landscapes, from portraits of animals to portraits of famous people, Jamie Wyeth has demonstrated his ability to observe his diverse environment—and the people within it—and capture its likeness and its mood on canvas.

Find out more about Jamie Wyeth on his Web site, Jamie Wyeth Editions.

For a detailed chronology of the life of James Wyeth, read this resource provided by the Farnsworth Museum of Art in their Teacher Packet.

Visual Art Vocabulary

Part of the Farnsworth Museum of Art's Teacher Packet, this comprehensive vocabulary list provides definitions to numerous visual art terms.