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Jun 19, 2012

Evasion

1947

Jared French

(American, 1905–1988)

America, 20th century

Tempera on canvas mounted to panel

Unframed: 54.5 x 29.2 x 0.7 cm (21 7/16 x 11 1/2 x 1/4 in.)

John L. Severance Fund 2012.31

Location

226B American Modern

Did you know?

French favored a form of tempera painting in which egg yolk is a primary ingredient.

Description

French was well regarded during the 1940s and ’50s as one of the most accomplished and fascinating magic realist painters. A still understudied group of artists, the magic realists revived painstaking old master techniques to make convincing their enigmatic images that address a wide range of personal and social concerns. Part of a series of works French made to chronicle the human condition, Evasion symbolizes an individual’s attempt to deny the physical self. As such, the painting manifests tensions regarding sexual mores in mid 20th-century America. While it is reductive to attribute French’s iconographic interest in Evasion solely to his bisexuality, the fact remains that French was one of the first American artists whose same-sex desires were recognized and acknowledged by contemporaries who viewed his work.

Inscriptions

Inscription

Inscribed upper left recto: "Jared French" Inscribed verso: "JARED FRENCH / egg yolk tempera / EVASION"

Provenance

1988-1991

Margaret French [1906-1998] (Midtown Payson Galleries, New York, NY, 1988, sold to Myron Kunin, 1991)

1991-2011

Myron Kunin [1925-2013], Minneapolis, MN ¹

2011

(Alexandre Fine Art, New York, NY, sold to Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH)

2012-

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Provenance Footnotes

¹Ownership variously listed under Regis Corporation Collection, Minneapolis; and Curtis Galleries, Minneapolis

Citations

Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting.New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1947. Reproduced: p. 8

Kirstein, Lincoln. Symbolic Realism in American Painting, 1940-1950. London: Institute of Contemporary Arts, 1950. Mentioned: p. 8

Munroe, Eleanor C. "Jared French." Art News 54 (April 1955) Mentioned: p. 47

Lonngren, Lillian. "Jared French." Art News 61 (March 1962) Mentioned: p. 14; Reproduced: p. 14

French, Jared "Artists on their Art." Art International 12 (April 20, 1968) Mentioned: p. 54

Jared French: 25 Years of Paintings and Drawings from 1944 to 1969. New York: Banfer Gallery, 1969. Reproduced: p. 1-2

Berman, Greta, and Jeffrey Wechsler. Realism and Realities: The Other Side of American Painting, 1940-1960 : [Catalogue of an Exhibition Held at] Rutgers University Art Gallery, New Brunswick, New Jersey, January 17-March 26, 1982, Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, Alabama, April 15-June 13, 1982, the Art Gallery, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, September 7-October 18, 1982. [New Brunswick, N.J.]: Rutgers University Art Gallery, 1982. Reproduced: p. 96

Grimes, Nancy. "Paul Cadmus, Jared French, George Tooker," Art News 89 (September 1990) Reproduced: p. 159

French, Jared, and Jeffrey Wechsler. The Rediscovery of Jared French. New York: Midtown Payson Galleries, 1992. Mentioned: p. 8, 14-15; Reproduced: p. 5

Grimes,Nancy. "French's Symbolic Figuration," Art in America 80 (November 1992) Mentioned: p. 114; Reproduced: p. 13

Grimes, Nancy, and Jared French. Jared French's Myths. San Francisco, Calif: Pomegranate Artbooks, 1993. Reproduced: pl. 21

Lucie-Smith, Edward. American Realism. New York: Abrams, 1994. Mentioned: p. 150-151; Reproduced: p. 150

Cole, Mark."Jared French (1905-1988)," Ph.D. dissertation, University of Delaware, 1999. Mentioned: 215, 269-270, 395; Reproduced: p. 513

Ōe, Kenzaburō. Le jeu du siècle. Paris: Gallimard, 2000, illus. cover (detail). Cover detail

Leddick, David. Intimate Companions: A Triography of George Platt Lynes, Paul Cadmus, Lincoln Kirstein, and Their Circle. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000. Mentioned: p. 223

Edgecombe, Rodney. "Jared French's Iconic Enigmas," The Gay and Lesbian Review 11, July-August 2004. Mentioned: p. 18

Armstrong, Elizabeth, and William C. Agee. Villa America: American Moderns, 1900-1950. Newport Beach, Calif: Orange County Museum of Art, 2005. Mentioned: p. 29-30, 128; Reproduced: p. 30, 128

Panzetta, Alfonso. Jared French by Jared French: 600 Opere indetite dal fondo italiano dell'artista. Turin, Italy: Allemandi, 2010. Mentioned: p. 25, 32-33, 134, 328, 350, 365; Reproduced: 134, 328

Litt, Steven. "Museum's East Wing Quietly Reopens, Revealing Impressive Changes," Plain Dealer, August 18, 2012. Mentioned: p. E3

Grant, Daniel. "Museums by the Numbers: 2012 in Review," Antiques and Fine Art 12 (Winter / Spring 2013) Mentioned: p. 153

Cole, Mark. "Acquistions 2012," Cleveland Art 53 (March / April 2013). Mentioned: p. 22

Artistic Excellence: Acquisitions 2012-14. Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014. Mentioned: p. 10, 49

Schreiber, Michael.One-Man Show: The Life and Art of Bernard Perlin. Berlin, Germany: Bruno Gmuender, 2016. Mentioned: p. 67

Miller, Angela. "Sinners all: the queer world of Paul Cadmus's seven deadly sins." American Art 36, no. 1 (Spring 2022): 111-136. reproduced p.129; mentioned p.128-129

Exhibition history

"Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting," Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, December 6, 1947-January 25, 1948

"Symbolic Realism in American Painting," Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, July 18-August 18, 1950

"Paintings and Drawings by Jared French," Edwin Hewitt Gallery, New York, April 21-May 12, 1955

"Jared French: Paintings and Drawings," Robert Isaacson Gallery, New York, February 6-24, 1962

"An Exhibition of Contemporary Painting, Sculpture, and Graphic Art," Academy Art Gallery, National Institute of Arts and Letters, New York, March 3-April 2, 1967

"Jared French: 25 Years of Paintings and Drawings from 1944 to 1969," Banfer Gallery, New York, February 19-March 8, 1969

"Close Encounters: The Art of Paul Cadmus, Jared French and George Tooker," Midtown Galleries, New York, February 22--April 7, 1990

"The Rediscovery of Jared French," Midtown Payson Galleries, New York, April 21-May 29, 1992; Mead Art Museum, Amherst College, MA, October 2-November 29, 1992

"Villa America: American Moderns, 1900-1950," Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA, June 4-October 2, 2005; Minneapolis Institute of Arts, December 4, 2005-February 26, 2006; Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX, March 15-June 4, 2006; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, September 23-December 31, 2006.

Cite this page

{{cite web|title=Evasion|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/2012.31|author=Jared French|year=1947|access-date=10 June 2023|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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Evasion

Evasion

Jared French

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