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John Marin - Biography

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John Marin (1870-1953) was an American artist who produced a prolific body of work in etching, oil paint, and watercolor, the last being the medium for which he is best known. Not a member of any artistic movement of the early twentieth-century, Marin stands out as an artist who truly forged his own path and style. In the mid-1890s, he studied architecture at the Stevens Institute of Technology.[1] Marin records that he spent four years working in architects’ offices, and some time doing freelance work thereafter.[2] Scholars credit this experience as an architectural draughtsman for the importance of drawing in Marin’s artistic practice and his preservation of the solidity of built forms.[3] In 1905, Marin left for Paris, where he found his first commercial success working in etchings.[4] He met other American artists, and made connections that would eventually lead him to Alfred Stieglitz. Importantly, Marin’s time in Paris introduced him to themes of modernity, both in art and architecture. The Eiffel Tower had been completed less than two decades earlier, and is still pointed to as an icon of urban modernity today.
 
[1] Jessica Murphy, “John Marin,” in Stieglitz and His Artists: Matisse to O’Keeffe. ed. Lisa Mintz Messenger (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2001): 156.
[2] John Marin, The Selected Writings of John Marin. ed. Dorothy Newman (New York: Pellegrini & Cudahy, 1949), ix.
[3] Martha Tedeschi, “Great Forces at Work: John Marin’s New York,” in John Marin’s Watercolors: A Medium for Modernism. ed. Martha Tedeschi and Kristi Dahm. (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2010), 124.
[4] Tamar Head, “John Marin’s “The Dance”,” MoMA No. 7 (Spring 1976): 5.