The Art Angle Podcast: The Unbelievable True Story of the Mystical Painter Agnes Pelton

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delves into the places where the art world meets the real world,
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Art history thrives on stories of fearless visionaries leaving
behind the lives they’ve known to embark on journeys into uncertain
lands for personal enrichment and artistic illumination. But few
are as surprising as that of Agnes Pelton, the spiritualist painter
who departed New York in 1932—alone, at the age of 50—to begin
a new chapter in the California desert. There, she supported
herself for years by selling realistic portraits and landscape
paintings to tourists while, largely unbeknownst to others, she
also pursued a connection to the divine through one of the most
forward-looking painting practices of the early 20th century.

A lifelong student of occult literature and unorthodox
philosophies, Pelton languished in obscurity for decades before and
after her death in 1961. But a handful of perceptive curators and
scholars eventually recognized the importance of her otherworldly,
semi-abstract canvases, which intermingle ethereal forms with a few
identifiable symbols loaded with deeper meaning, such as stars and
mountains. Pelton’s supporters first succeeded in bringing her work
to the larger art world’s attention in the late 1980s, and more
than 30 years later, she became the subject of a sweeping and
critically admired solo
exhibition that traveled to the Whitney Museum of American
Art this spring (before the museum, like so many others, was forced
to close until further notice).

On this week’s episode, curator Barbara Haskell, who oversaw the
Whitney’s installation of Pelton’s show, joins Andrew Goldstein to
discuss the artist’s scandal-plagued upbringing, all-consuming
engagement with spiritualism, and lasting relevance in a world once
again seeking greater meaning beyond the physical realm.

Listen above and subscribe to the Art Angle on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, or wherever you get your podcasts. (Or
catch up on past
episodes here on Artnet News.)

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