In the Studio with John Willenbecher

“Hard to believe that it’s been almost sixty years since I started making art. In school days I thought the thing to do was to be an art historian and I majored in that at college -- and then went on for three more years at N.Y.U.’s Institute of Fine Arts. It took me that long to realize that what I really wanted to do was create art.

Back in the 1960s I began by making three-dimensional, painted wood constructions. And although I have subsequently been doing two-dimensional work, I have used only wooden supports (never having gone to art school I have no idea how to stretch a canvas!). The paintings, in acrylics, are on fiberboard panels and rest on shelves -- which are part of the work. By sitting on shelves the works beg, as any object might, to be manipulated. And so they can be: the viewer is free to turn them at will. I like to think of it as a process of refreshment.”

You can see more of John’s art in his Hyperallergic studio visit.