Artist Assistants

[John Iverson]

I'm researching an article about visual artists using assistants in their
work. It's a fairly open-ended topic. One could use assistants for help on
the business end, to do the scutt work around the studio, stretch canvas,
mat and frame pieces etc. And, of course, one or more assistants in a sure
sign that you've "arrived" -- Andy Warhol and Michelangelo both had
assistants.

So, if any of you have had any experience or even just thoughts on this
topic, I'd love to pick your brain. Unless we get a good thread going here,
probably the easiest way to get your info to me is via email to
jo...@jiverson.com. FYI I am an arts & crafts business consultant with too
little free time as it is, so please don't construe this inquiry as an
indirect spam to pick up more work. If you're curious, surf on over to
www.jiverson.com for a short course on the business of art.

Thanks,

John Iverson

[Erik A. Mattila]

Huge topic, John. Here, off the top of my head: Albrecht Durer, Lucas
Cranach, Hans Holbien, The Bruegels, Peter Paul Rubens, Pablo Picasso - and
many more had art 'factories' full of assistants (apprentices, craftsmen,
etc.) Most of the woodblocks associated with the 15th century Northern
European printing industry were carved by members of the carpenter's guild,
after the designs of the artist. It goes on and on. In fact, the loner artist
is a relatively modern phenenoma. But Picasso set up a pottery factory on his
estate, complete with a master potter who made the cups and saucer the artist
scribbled. Picasso himself was his father's assistant as a child, and he
excelled in painting the feet on Dad's favorite subject, pigeons (doves).
Eugene Delacroix was Gericault's assistant during the painting of the latter's
salon piece, "The Raft of the Medusa." Both Gericault and Delacroix were able
to convince pretty young ladies to assist them in their studios by reading
Dante in Italian while they painted. And we haven't even touched on the
apprentice tradition yet. How many words does your article have to be?

By the way, the reason for the 'art factories' is quite interesting, especially
from the perspective of art business. There were no photographs then, of
course. So, for example, Henry the Eighth would want to distribute Christmas
gifts among his cousins, aunts and uncles throughout Europe, and he would
commission an artist such as Hans Holbein to produce a 'twentyfive-off' line
of portraits, all being the same. It was just good business to set up a
factory to do this kind of work, which constituted a major part of the
commissions the artists would secure in those days. As for the printmakers,
since there was no off-set lithography, the bread and butter commissions were
either political illustrations or religious illustrations, these being the main
focus of book-printing in those days. So when tracing down the history of a
set of wood-cuts, such as "The Ressurection of Christ" you can find that the
same set of illustration was recycled through different books published at
different times. Sometimes the artist did the recycling, but most of the time
the original publisher would 'own' the wood blocks and sell them to another
publisher.

Erik Mattila