J.C. Hall Textured Mixed Media Painting "What Am I Doing Here?"
Item Details
J.C. (Jim) Hall (American, Ohio, 1932 – 2017)
What Am I Doing Here?, 21st century
Acrylic paint and pumice texture medium with rhinestones on canvas
Signed to the lower right
A mixed media acrylic painting on canvas titled What Am I Doing Here? by Cincinnati artist J. C. Hall (Ohio; 1932- 2017). This typographic grid design featuring the titular phrase ‘What Am I Doing Here?’ in a variety of fonts, with each word painted against a separate rectangular ground. A pumice-based medium is used to add varied levels of raised texture to the surface, and acrylic rhinestones are laid into the border. The artist’s signature is present to the lower right corner of the painting.
Provenance
From the estate of the artist.
J.C. (Jim) Hall was a Kentucky-born artist and lived most of his adult life in Sharonville, Ohio, where he raised his family. He was an ordained minister in his teens and later joined the Navy, however an injury during training ended his enlistment. The money from his honorable discharge and his job at Proctor & Gamble allowed Hall to buy painting supplies and launch his prolific art career. The artist worked mostly with acrylic and watercolors, and at times, embellished his compositions with additional materials, such as sand or beads, for textural effects. His subject matters range from vibrant tropical scenes, geometric cityscapes, and humorous art history parodies. However, it is Hall’s development of Lineillism that is credited as his most significant creative accomplishment and contribution to the contemporary art world.
Lineillism is a painting technique and style that Hall conceived after contracting shingles in 2000. The infection introduced a dramatic change to the artist’s vision, causing him to see the world in lines. What some may view as a handicap resulted in the artist’s stylistic revolution. His Lineillist paintings are rendered with thousands of vertical lines that emphasize the play of light and create an element of transience in his compositions. Hall’s innovation is not only the subject of the award-winning documentary Lines of Sight (2016), but was featured in a traveling exhibition Lineillism Revealed, which debuted at the Behringer-Crawford Museum in 2017.
To view the award-winning documentary Lines of Sight (2016) unveiling J.C. Hall’s painting technique Lineillism, please see the link attached below.
Condition
- edge wear to canvas with scuffs and chips to pumice medium; taped repairs to canvas verso.
Dimensions
Item #
ITMG462999
Additional Information