Joseph Raphael: Transformations
For the past 35 years Joseph Raffael has devoted himself to the medium of watercolor to explore nature, its richness, its mysteries, its depths. Much of what he has painted has been in his own backyard, the varied rainbow-colored flowers from his garden, the shimmering carp from his pond, the multi-colored birds from his backyard aviaries. For his newest series, the artist combined his love of pure nature with that of animals, what he called “spirit beings.” Seeing an image of a bee in flight about to land on a blue flower piqued his interest to begin the series. The suggestion of flight, a quiver of movement, almost impossible to capture, became a touchstone to renewed energy in the work.
Years ago, Raffael was called the most important artist working in watercolor in this country by James Speyer, former curator of 20th century art at the Chicago Art Institute. This proves to be true to this day. These are not simple paintings, each is a rich statement about life, about possibility, about renewal. Throughout his life, the artist was in dialogue about beauty, in many ways, it was the watchword of his practice, a constant conversation with brush in hand throughout his life. A yellowtail butterfly alights on rich green blades of grass woven so tightly on the ground we see no dirt. We are dazzled by the myriad greens; there must be 20-30 colors of green if we study the full expanse. In nature’s casual arrangement of grasses, the butterfly seems almost regal, formal, heroic, symbolic of life’s passages. An owl gazes full face at the viewer, peacefully perched on its branch, the symbol of wisdom. A dog peers through soft ferns, seeming to anticipate an encounter, man’s best friend, waiting, patient. Each image is a dialogue. The artist said of beauty:
“Opening ourselves to beauty, we let go of ‘rational mind,’ and the critic within us, and we become part of a trusted flow, not concerned where it will take us.”
His “beings” are resplendent reflections on life, meditations on what it means to be alive, engaged, in dialogue. Each work is an ode to life in multi-color, “jewel-encrusted” passages of watercolor. Simply stated, Raffael’s “beings” are what he called “beyond appearances.” And as he often said: “My painting is and always has been a kind of conversation with mystery.”
Joseph Raffael was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1933, he died in the South of France in the summer of 2021. He attended Cooper Union, New York and received his B.F.A. from Yale School of Fine Arts. His work is represented in over 50 museums throughout this country, among them The Art Institute of Chicago, The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, The Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Oakland Museum, Philadelphia Museum of Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Walker Art Center, Whitney Museum of American Art.
