To counterpoint descriptions of stuffy old folk pensioner artists and genre?

[Elleherd]

Not a thread about a thread, a thread wanting to counteract the casual ageism assumed and allowed about older artists.

Or will I be deleted?

Artists start out young and if they're lucky, end up old. The body of their work may be continued iterations of earlier work or may change massively over time. Some don't even emerge as contemporary artists until post pensionable age.

Could this be a thread celebrating diverse older artists without getting into what prompted it? Keeping it about older artists and different genres?

Some famous female ones just of the top of my head:

Lubaina Himid
Luchita Hurtado
Carmen Herrera
Yayoi Kusama
Louise Bourgeois
Howardena Pindell
Marina Abramovic
Phyllida Barlow

If this thread is allowed to stand, please feel free to add artists over 65 whose work isn't 'traditional art.' 🙂

😂Well I clearly was being. Fair enough.

Not a female artist but look at the way Hockney has developed digital tech to make new work . Including the extraordinary Lightroom installation.

Not sure what you mean by 'traditional'? As contemporary art started around 1945 just about anyone alive is from that era. Or do you mean traditional style like, I don't know, country landscapes? Don't know any artists doing that, though perhaps hobbyists (the King for example).
I've always liked Maggi Hambling.

There is a great book I really enjoyed called Old in Art School by a woman who goes to art school in her 60s and totally re-aligns her artistic taste so that she is doing work that is relevant to today's art market. You might enjoy it, OP!

I visited the Marina Abramovic exhibition at the Royal Academy a couple of weeks ago, it was incredible and also very, very well attended. Deeply relevant.

There's a very good article about in last week's Times Mag by Caitlin Moran - how she thought performance art was rubbish and her daughter bought her tickets to MAbramovic and she loved it and now totally gets it. Well worth reading.

Great idea for a thread OP, I hope I'll come back to it with more later!

Thanks I might buy this. (I'm not supposed to be buying any more books at the mo because we're moving house so I'm supposed to be getting rid of books not adding to them. But hey!) 😂

YANBU. The poll closed too quickly!

mondaytosunday tbh 'traditional' did wrongly refer to landscapes and flowers that were apparently the genre of artists over 65. (Not that there's anything wrong with landscapes and flowers)
This was a bit of a knee jerk reaction from me to some exhausting MN ageism that's nothing new here but was particularly depressing to find from people interested in discussing art.
It was a few days ago and sank without response, then someone bumped it with a YABU vote just as it was closing.😂

Nice to see everyone here though.

heldinadream I went to M.Abramovic at the RA too. Not all of it is my cup of tea, but some of it is excellent.

myphoneisbroken thanks for the recommendation.

BTW @Elleherd I'm 68 and a late-learning artist. Always thought I was a writer, still am but doing visual art now too.
Yes I agree re Abramovic, some of it really interesting some less so but overall an impressive body of work and clarity of purpose.
Yoko Ono coming to the Tate later this year too, and also this at Tate Brit (historical but important IMHO).

Now You see Us | Tate Britain

Marmite incoming... 😂
Yoko Ono | Tate Modern

Rose Wylie!

I loved the Abramovic show. So did my daughter. And my MIL.

The RA summer show is a great place to see artists of all ages doing work of all kinds.

MIL has been an artist all her life, when her other responsibilities allowed. She is no less creative and reacted than she has ever been. The difference is now she has the time and space to do why she loves.

At 78 she now works out of a studio in Shoreditch, often painting massive canvases, some of which feature prints of her boobs. She’s just exhibited in a show where the second oldest artist was 38.

If I asked her to paint a bowl of fruit, I reckon she’d puke in my lap!

I can’t wait for that. DD’s will be coming too, lured by lunch at Skylon.

We are so lucky to have Tate Modern.

I didn't see any other threads that might have prompted you into posting about this, but were they referring to people who take up art in retirement, or artists who just happen to live past 60 and still produce work?

If the latter:

Sheila Hicks
Paula Rego

I'm sure Eva Hesse would have carried on if she hadn't died young.

I can't actually think of many older "traditional" women artists. Elizabeth Blackadder might fit the description, although her style wasn't exactly traditional when she started.

Plumpalicious I'm trying to avoid too much reference to what inspired this, but just being a practicing artist at a certain age which I guess covers both.

Paula Rego's work is even better in the flesh btw.

LaChienneDesFromages Excellent, but I suspect she might well paint the end result!

I must go back to work, but will be come later.

US folk art artist Grandma Moses only started painting in earnest at the age of 78.

Barbara Hepworth was extraordinary throughout her creative life. And groundbreaking.

I went to the exhibition of her work at the Towner in Eastbourne last year.

Can I pop in a 47 year old that people may not have heard of? Lynette Yiadom-Boakye had a major exhibition at Tate Britain in 2022/3 which I saw and I was blown away with her work. On the surface she's a figurative painter, but the difference is she imagines all the people she paints, no real life models, and also gives her paintings strange narrative titles which hint to something else going on. The paintings themselves are incredible, rich and vibrant and large and the eyes especially are hypnotic. Try and see her work if you can! I'll post some examples in another post.

An Introduction to Lynette Yiadom-Boakye | Tate

I didn’t even know that this was an issue - I thought that artists and art lovers were beyond stereotypes like ageism. Bit depressing to realise that it is a problem!

I don’t know many of the names mentioned but remember that Barbara Hepworth’s life was cut short by a horrible accidental death in her early seventies - had she lived her full life span she might have been producing work well into her eighties and possibly even her nineties.

Some pics of her work. 💜
The Matters.
Ever the Women Watchful.
Mercy Over Matter.

As Yayoi Kusama, creator of the Infinity Rooms installation at Tate Modern is doing in her mid 90s!
https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/yayoi-kusama-infinity-mirror-rooms