Jess Collins: Difference between revisions

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| imagesize    =  
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| birth_name     = Burgess Franklin Collins
| birth_name   = Burgess Franklin Collins
| birth_date     = {{Birth date |1923|8|6}}
| birth_date   = {{Birth date |1923|8|6}}
| birth_place     = [[Long Beach, California]]
| birth_place   = [[Long Beach, California]]
| death_date     = {{death date and age |2004|1|2|1923|8|6}}
| death_date   = {{death date and age |2004|1|2|1923|8|6}}
| death_place   =
| death_place  =  
| nationality   = [[United States|American]]
| field        = [[Visual art]]
| field        = [[Visual art]]
| training      = [[San Francisco Art Institute]]
| training      = [[San Francisco Art Institute]]
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'''Jess Collins''' (August 6, 1923 – January 2, 2004), simply known today as '''Jess''', was an American visual artist.
'''Jess Collins''' (August 6, 1923 – January 2, 2004), known today simply as '''Jess''', was an American visual artist.


== Biography ==
== Life and career ==
Jess was born Burgess Franklin Collins in [[Long Beach, California]]. He was drafted into the military and worked on the production of [[plutonium]] for the [[Manhattan Project]].<ref name="Jess">{{Cite web |title=Jess |url=https://www.sfmoma.org/artist/jess/ |access-date=2024-01-25 |website=SFMOMA |language=en-US}}</ref>  After his discharge in 1946, Jess worked at the [[Hanford Atomic Energy Project]] in [[Richland, Washington]], and painted in his spare time, but his dismay at the threat of [[atomic weapon]]s led him to abandon his scientific career and focus on his art.
Jess was born Burgess Franklin Collins in [[Long Beach, California]]. He was drafted into the military and worked on the production of [[plutonium]] for the [[Manhattan Project]].<ref name="Jess">{{Cite web |title=Jess |url=https://www.sfmoma.org/artist/jess/ |access-date=2024-01-25 |website=SFMOMA |language=en-US}}</ref>  After his discharge in 1946, Jess worked at the [[Hanford Atomic Energy Project]] in [[Richland, Washington]], and painted in his spare time, but his dismay at the threat of [[atomic weapon]]s led him to abandon his scientific career and focus on his art.


In 1949, Jess enrolled in the California School of the Arts (now the [[San Francisco Art Institute]]) and, after breaking with his family, began referring to himself simply as "Jess".<ref name="Jess"/> In the late 1940s, Jess met [[Robert Duncan (poet)|Robert Duncan]] and the painter [[Lyn Brockway]], and became active in numerous exhibitions, poetry gatherings, and creative endeavors through their circle.<ref name="Jess"/> He met [[Robert Duncan (poet)|Robert Duncan]] in 1951 and began a relationship with the poet that lasted for 37 years until Duncan's death in 1988.<ref name="Jess"/><ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=McDowell |first=Tara |date=2019-10-15 |title=A Household of Minor Things: The Collections of Robert Duncan and Jess |url=https://lithub.com/a-household-of-minor-things-the-collections-of-robert-duncan-and-jess/ |access-date=2025-01-30 |website=Literary Hub |language=en-US}}</ref> In 1952, in San Francisco, Jess, with Duncan and painter [[Harry Jacobus]], opened the [[King Ubu Gallery]], which became an important venue for alternative art and which remained so when, in 1954, poet [[Jack Spicer]] reopened the space as the [[Six Gallery reading|Six Gallery]].
In 1949, Jess enrolled in the California School of the Arts (subsequently the [[San Francisco Art Institute]]) where he studied under [[Clyfford Still]], [[David Park (painter)|David Park]], [[Hassel Smith]], and [[Edward Corbett (artist)|Edward Corbett]]. He received a [[Bachelor of Fine Arts|BFA]] degree in 1951. in 1949 he broke with his family, and thereafter referred to himself simply as "Jess."<ref name="Jess"/><ref name = Baker>{{Cite news |last=Baker |first=Kenneth |date=2004-01-07 |title=San Francisco Art Institute: Jess Collins, BFA 1951 | url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070927063648/http://www.sfai.edu/People/Person.aspx?id=147&navID=6&sectionID=2&typeID=1 | work = San Francisco Chronicle}}</ref>


Many of Jess's paintings and [[collage]]s have themes drawn from [[chemistry]], [[alchemy]], the [[occult]], and male beauty, including a series called ''Translations'' (1959–1976) which is done with heavily laid-on paint in a [[paint-by-number]] style. In 1975, the [[Wadsworth Atheneum]] displayed six of the "Translations" paintings in their ''Matrix 2'' exhibition.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://2gc0771gkd8m295j5p2hvgje72l.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Matrix-2.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2014-02-21 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140307060723/http://2gc0771gkd8m295j5p2hvgje72l.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Matrix-2.pdf |archive-date=2014-03-07 }}</ref> In the late 1950s, Jess also filled [[Pauline Kael]]'s home on Oregon St in Berkeley, CA, with fantastical and Romantic murals, which still adorn the walls today.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Dinkelspiel |first=Frances |date=2016-05-09 |title=The Jess murals at former Pauline Kael house are saved |url=http://www.berkeleyside.org/2016/05/09/the-jess-murals-at-former-pauline-kael-house-are-saved |access-date=2024-03-31 |website=Berkeleyside |language=en-US}}</ref> Collins also created elaborate collages using old book illustrations and [[comic strip]]s (particularly, the strip ''[[Dick Tracy]]'', which he used to make his own strip ''Tricky Cad'').  Jess's final work, ''Narkissos'', is a complex rendered 6'x5' drawing owned by the [[San Francisco Museum of Modern Art]].
He met [[Robert Duncan (poet)|Robert Duncan]] in 1950 and began a relationship with the poet that lasted for 37 years until Duncan's death in 1988. The two men lived and worked for decades from their historic [[Victorian architecture|Victorian]] home in the [[Mission District, San Francisco|Mission District]], "a wonderland of an old house, filled to the roof with art," more than 5,000 books, and 5,300 music records.<ref name=Cotter/><ref name="Jess"/><ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=McDowell |first=Tara |date=2019-10-15 |title=A Household of Minor Things: The Collections of Robert Duncan and Jess |url=https://lithub.com/a-household-of-minor-things-the-collections-of-robert-duncan-and-jess/ |access-date=2025-01-30 |website=Literary Hub |language=en-US}}</ref> Through Duncan and the painter [[Lyn Brockway]] he became active in numerous exhibitions, poetry gatherings, and creative endeavors.


A Jess retrospective (''Jess: A Grand Collage, 1951–1993'') toured the United States in 1993 to 1994, accompanied by a book of the same title.  The book included pictures of some of the paintings and collages from the tour. Interspersed between the pictures were essays by various contributors including poet [[Michael Palmer (poet)|Michael Palmer]] who wrote an extended piece on Jess's ''Narkissos.''
In 1952, in San Francisco, Jess, with Duncan and painter [[Harry Jacobus]], opened the [[King Ubu Gallery]], which became an important venue for alternative art and which remained so when, in 1954, poet [[Jack Spicer]] reopened the space as the [[Six Gallery reading|Six Gallery]].


Sections of Jess's paintings 'Arkadia Last Resort' were used by [[Faithless]] in 2004 for the front covers to their single "[[I Want More (Faithless song)|I Want More]]".
In the late 1950s, Jess filled [[Pauline Kael]]'s home on Oregon Street in [[Berkeley, California]], with fantastical murals which still adorn the walls today.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Dinkelspiel |first=Frances |date=2016-05-09 |title=The Jess murals at former Pauline Kael house are saved |url=http://www.berkeleyside.org/2016/05/09/the-jess-murals-at-former-pauline-kael-house-are-saved |access-date=2024-03-31 |website=Berkeleyside |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| title = Miraculous Murals Hide Within a Berkeley Brown Shingle | author = Dave Weinsten | date = June 12, 2014| url = https://www.eichlernetwork.com/blog/dave-weinstein/miraculous-murals-hide-within-berkeley-brown-shingle | access-date = 2025-10-06 | website = www.eichlernetwork.com}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| title = Dream House: Jess's Murals | author = Greil Marcus | date = May 16, 2018| url = https://greilmarcus.net/2018/05/16/dream-house-jesss-murals-11-14/ | access-date = 2025-10-27 | website = greilmarcus.net/}}</ref>


In 2008, an exhibition of Jess's drawings was held at [[Gallery Paule Anglim]] in San Francisco.<ref>[http://www.gallerypauleanglim.com/Gallery_Paule_Anglim/Jess.html Gallery Paule Anglim, Artist profile Jess] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120331032329/http://www.gallerypauleanglim.com/Gallery_Paule_Anglim/Jess.html |date=2012-03-31 }}, February 6 - March 1, 2008</ref>
Many of Jess's works have themes drawn from [[chemistry]], [[alchemy]], the [[occult]], and male beauty, including a series of paintings called ''Translations'' (1959–1976) which is done with heavily laid-on paint in a [[paint-by-number]] style. Jess also created elaborate collages using old book illustrations and [[comic strip]]s (particularly, the strip ''[[Dick Tracy]]'', which he used to make his own strip ''Tricky Cad'').<ref name=Tricky />


In 2014 and 2015, a traveling exhibit titled "An Opening of the Field: Jess, Robert Duncan, and Their Circle" toured across the country to warm reception.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Cotter |first=Holland |date=2014-01-16 |title=The Company They Kept |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/arts/design/robert-duncan-and-jess-and-their-wonderland-of-art.html |access-date=2025-01-30 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}</ref> The exhibit explored what it was like for the couple to be "young, gifted, and odd" in San Francisco after World War II.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Staff |first=The Week |date=2014-02-19 |title=Exhibit of the week: An Opening of the Field: Jess, Robert Duncan, and Their Circle |url=https://theweek.com/articles/450637/exhibit-week-opening-field-jess-robert-duncan-circle |access-date=2025-01-30 |website=theweek |language=en}}</ref> The two men lived and worked for decades from their historic [[Victorian architecture|Victorian]] home in the [[Mission District, San Francisco|Mission District]], which was lined with more than 5,000 books, 5,300 music records, and countless works of visual art.<ref name=":0" />
Art citic [[Holland Cotter]] identifies three distinct facets of Jess's artistic oeuvre.<blockquote>He started out doing shadowy abstract paintings, influenced by his teacher, [[Edward Corbett (artist)|Edward Corbett]]...It wasn’t long before Jess developed a technique that was better suited to his gift for meditative, labor-intensive precision: paintings with thickly layered surfaces from which images seemed to be incised...Jess is best known for his [[collage]]s, which he called paste-ups: staggeringly intricate symbolic narratives pieced together from bits of scientific treatises, muscle magazines, art history books, cartoons and popular periodicals like [[Life (magazine)|''Life'']] and [[Time (magazine)|''Time'']].<ref name=Cotter/></blockquote>


== Museum collections ==
Harry Parker, director of the [[Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco]], called Jess "the essential San Francisco artist. His political views and his quirky artistic style, his association with the poetry scene, his advocacy of gay rights—all the issues that came into his work were so representative of the San Francisco perspective. Only here could you imagine work like his being made."<ref name = Baker />
* [[San Francisco Museum of Modern Art]], San Francisco, CA<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/96.492/|title=Jess, Narkissos, 1976-1991|last=|first=|date=|website=SFMOMA|archive-url=|archive-date=|url-status=|access-date=2019-01-22}}</ref>
 
* The [[Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco]], San Francisco, CA<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://art.famsf.org/jess-burgess-franklin-collins/enamord-mage-translation-6-200587|title=The Enamord Mage: Translation #6 - Jess (Burgess Franklin Collins)|date=2015-05-08|website=FAMSF Search the Collections|language=en|access-date=2019-01-22}}</ref>
The year 2019 saw the publication of ''The Householders: Robert Duncan and Jess'' by Tara McDowell (MIT Press), the first book-length study of the couple, a work of both biography and critical analysis, and, in the words of the press release, "a love story."<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Householders: Robert Duncan and Jess | url=https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262042710/the-householders/ |access-date=2025-10-27 |website= mitpress.mit.edu |language=en-US}}</ref>
* The [[Di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art]], Napa, CA<ref>{{cite web|title=The Collection|url=http://www.dirosaart.org/about/the-collection/|website=dirosaart.org|date=16 June 2010 |access-date=2016-11-03}}</ref>
 
* The [[Museum of Modern Art]], New York City, NY<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.moma.org/artists/2913?locale=en|title=Jess {{!}} MoMA|website=The Museum of Modern Art|language=en|access-date=2019-01-24}}</ref>
==Exhibitions==
* The [[Metropolitan Museum of Art]], New York City, NY<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/626876?searchField=All&amp;sortBy=relevance&amp;who=Jess$Jess&amp;ft=*&amp;offset=0&amp;rpp=20&amp;pos=1 |title=Caesar's Gate IV |date= 1955 |website=www.metmuseum.org |access-date=2019-01-24}}</ref>
At mid-career, Jess's art received international attention with solo exhibitions at the [[The Museum of Modern Art]] in New York (1974), the [[Galleria Odyssia]] in Rome (1975), the [[Wadsworth Atheneum]]<ref>{{cite web |url=http://2gc0771gkd8m295j5p2hvgje72l.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Matrix-2.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2014-02-21 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140307060723/http://2gc0771gkd8m295j5p2hvgje72l.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Matrix-2.pdf |archive-date=2014-03-07 }}</ref> (1975), the [[Dallas Museum of Art|Dallas Museum of Fine Arts]] (1977), the [[Berkeley Art Museum]] (1980), and [[The Arts Club of Chicago]] (1981).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.tibordenagy.com/attachment/en/56fbcb51cfaf34be168b4568/TextOneColumnWithFile/56fbcb53cfaf34be168b4737|title=Jess (Curriculum Vitae)|access-date=2025-10-27|website=www.tibordenagy.com}}</ref>
* The [[Whitney Museum|Whitney Museum of American Art]], New York City, NY
 
* The [[National Gallery of Art]], Washington, D.C.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.97502.html|title=Ex. 5 - Mind's I: Translation #12|website=www.nga.gov|access-date=2019-01-24}}</ref>
In 1983-84, the [[John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art]] in  Sarasota, Florida mounted the exhibition ''Jess, Paste-Ups (and Assemblies), 1951-1983'' and published a companion book.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://emuseum.ringling.org/exhibitions/275/jess-pasteups19511983|title=Jess Paste-Ups: 1951-1983|access-date=2025-10-07|website=emuseum.ringling.org}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books/about/Jess_Paste_Ups_and_Assemblies_1951_1983.html?id=eaVPAAAAMAAJ|title=Jess, Paste Ups (and Assemblies), 1951-1983|access-date=2025-10-07|website=books.google.com}}</ref>
* The [[Crocker Art Museum]], Sacramento, CA<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.crockerart.org/collections/american-art-after-1945/artworks/feignting-spell-1954|title=Feignting Spell, 1954|website=Crocker Art Museum|access-date=2019-01-24}}</ref>
 
A Jess retrospective, ''Jess: A Grand Collage, 1951–1993'', toured the United States in 1993 to 1994. The companion book featured essays by contributors including poet [[Michael Palmer (poet)|Michael Palmer]], who wrote an extended piece on Jess's monumental ''Narkissos'', a complexly rendered 70"x60" drawing (graphite and gouache on cut and pasted paper) acquired in 1996 by the [[San Francisco Museum of Modern Art]].<ref name="Jess"/>
 
In 2004, three details from Jess's monumental collage ''Arkadia's Last Resort; or, Fête Champêtre Up Mnemosyne Creek''<ref name=Arkadia /> were used by [[Faithless]] to illustrate their release "[[I Want More (Faithless song)|I Want More]]."
 
From 2007 to 2009, the posthumous traveling exhibition ''Jess: To and From the Printed Page'' included paintings from his ''Translations'' series together with many of his collages and designs, as well as the books and magazines in which they were reproduced. The exhibition appeared at the [[San Jose Museum of Art]], the [[Madison Museum of Contemporary Art]], the [[Pasadena Museum of California Art]], the [[Harry Ransom Center]] at the [[University of Texas at Austin]], the Douglas F. Cooley Gallery at [[Reed College]], the [[University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art]], and the [[Rollins Museum of Art]] at [[Rollins College]].<ref>{{cite web | url = https://web.archive.org/web/20060907032811/http://ici-exhibitions.org/Exhibitions/jess/jess.html | website = ici-exhibitions.org | access-date = 2025-10-06 | title = Jess: To and From the Printed Page}}</ref>
 
In 2014 and 2015, the traveling exhibition ''An Opening of the Field: Jess, Robert Duncan, and Their Circle'' appeared at the [[Grey Art Gallery]] at [[New York University]], the [[Katzen Arts Center]] at [[American University]] in Washington, D.C., and the [[Pasadena Museum of California Art]]. As [[Holland Cotter]] wrote in ''[[The New York Times]]'', the exhibition explored what it was like for the couple to be "young, gifted, and odd" in San Francisco after World War II. "Espousers of the power of the imagination," Jess and Duncan "created a self-contained world, and their friends were welcomed in." Combining 45 of the couple's own works with 85 works by roughly 30 of their close associates, the show shed light on what was less a movement than a "psychic collaboration, the communal property of lovers, spouses, and friends....Maybe the sense of unity [in the exhibition] comes from the presence of a marriage at its center, a same-sex union that lasted almost 40 years."<ref name=Cotter>{{Cite news |last=Cotter |first=Holland |date=2014-01-16 |title=The Company They Kept |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/17/arts/design/robert-duncan-and-jess-and-their-wonderland-of-art.html |access-date=2025-01-30 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Staff |first=The Week |date=2014-02-19 |title=Exhibit of the week: An Opening of the Field: Jess, Robert Duncan, and Their Circle |url=https://theweek.com/articles/450637/exhibit-week-opening-field-jess-robert-duncan-circle |access-date=2025-01-30 |website=theweek |language=en}}</ref>
 
In 2019, the [[San Francisco Museum of Modern Art]] mounted the show ''Mythos, Psyche, Eros: Jess and California'', which paired paintings and collages "that privileged the mystical, whimsical, and absurd" by "one of San Francisco’s most enigmatic figures...with pieces by other California artists, who together reflect the West Coast’s unusual romantic legacy."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Mythos, Psyche, Eros: Jess and California|url=https://www.sfmoma.org/exhibition/mythos-psyche-eros-jess-and-california/ |access-date=2025-10-26 |website=SFMOMA |language=en-US}}</ref>
 
== In museum collections ==
* [[Art Institute of Chicago]], Chicago, IL<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.artic.edu/artworks/36726/fig-204-gastro-duodenostomy-kocher|title=Fig. 204–Gastro-duodenostomy (Kocher)|website=www.artic.edu}}</ref>
* [[Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive]], Berkeley, CA<ref>{{cite web|url=https://collection.bampfa.berkeley.edu/?op=OR&search_field=artistcalc_s&q=Jess+Collins|title=Jess Collins|access-date=2025-09-07|website=bampfa.berkeley.edu/}}</ref>
* [[Crocker Art Museum]], Sacramento, CA<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.crockerart.org/art/detail/feignting-spell-jess-jess-2009-76|title=Feignting Spell, 1954|website=Crocker Art Museum|access-date=2025-09-07}}</ref>
* [[Dallas Museum of Art]], Dallas, TX<ref name=Arkadia>{{cite web|title=Arkadia's Last Resort; or, Fête Champêtre Up Mnemosyne Creek|access-date=2025-09-07|url=https://dma.org/art/collection/object/5145872|website=dma.org}}</ref>
* [[Di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art]], Napa, CA<ref>{{cite web|title=di Rosa Artist List|url=https://www.dirosaart.org/di-rosa-artist-list/|date=16 June 2010 |access-date=2025-09-07}}</ref>
* [[Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco]], San Francisco, CA (28 works)<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.famsf.org/art-finder?artist=1458|title=Jess Collins (Burgess Franklin Collins)|date=2025-09-07|website=FAMSF Collections search|language=en|access-date=2019-01-22}}</ref>
* [[Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden]], Washington, D.C.<ref name=Tricky>{{cite web|url=https://collections.si.edu/search/results.htm?q=%22Hirshhorn+Museum+and+Sculpture+Garden%22&gfq=CSILP_1&fq=data_source%3A%22Hirshhorn+Museum+and+Sculpture+Garden%22&fq=name%3A%22Jess%22&view=masonry&start=0|title=Jess|access-date=2025-10-07|website=hirshhorn.si.edu}}</ref>
* [[Metropolitan Museum of Art]], New York City, NY<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/626876?searchField=All&amp;sortBy=relevance&amp;who=Jess$Jess&amp;ft=*&amp;offset=0&amp;rpp=20&amp;pos=1 |title=Caesar's Gate IV |date= 1955 |website=www.metmuseum.org |access-date=2019-01-24}}</ref>
* [[Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago|Museum of Contemporary Art]], Chicago, IL<ref>{{cite web|url=https://mcachicago.org/about/who-we-are/people/jess-jess-collins|title=Jess (Jess Collins)|access-date=2025-10-07|website=mcachicago.org}}</ref>
* [[Museum of Modern Art]], New York City, NY<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.moma.org/artists/2913?locale=en|title=Jess {{!}} MoMA|website=The Museum of Modern Art|language=en|access-date=2019-01-24}}</ref>
* [[National Gallery of Art]], Washington, D.C.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.97502.html|title=Ex. 5 - Mind's I: Translation #12|website=www.nga.gov|access-date=2019-01-24}}</ref>
* [[Oakland Museum of California]], Oakland, CA<ref>{{cite web|url=https://portal.museumca.org/catalog/?&op=AND&search_field=objectproductionperson_txt&q=Jess%20Collins|title=Jess Collins|access-date=2025-09-07|website=portal.museumca.org}}</ref>
* [[Philadelphia Museum of Art]], Philadelphia, PA<ref>{{cite web|url=https://philamuseum.org/search/collections?filters=%7B%22artist%22%3A%5B%22Jess%20(Jess%20Collins)%22%5D%7D|title=Jess Collins|access-date=2025-10-07|website=philamuseum.org}}</ref>
* [[San Francisco Museum of Modern Art]], San Francisco, CA<ref name="Jess"/>
* [[Whitney Museum|Whitney Museum of American Art]], New York City, NY
 
==Papers==
The Jess Papers collection is stored at the [[Bancroft Library]] at the [[University of California, Berkeley]], and consists of correspondence, manuscripts, flyers, announcements, clippings, writings, artwork, and miscellaneous materials.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://search.library.berkeley.edu/discovery/fulldisplay?docid=alma991050834559706532&context=L&vid=01UCS_BER:UCB&lang=en&search_scope=MyInstitution&adaptor=Local%20Search%20Engine&tab=LibraryCatalog&query=title,exact,Jess%20papers,%201941-2004%20(bulk%201962-1997,AND&mode=advanced&offset=0|title=Jess papers, 1941-2004 (bulk 1962-1997)|access-date=2025-10-26|website=search.library.berkeley.edu}}</ref>
 
==Publications==
*''Jess, Paste Ups (and Assemblies), 1951-1983'', exhibition catalogue, text by Michael Auping. John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, 1983.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books/about/Jess_Paste_Ups_and_Assemblies_1951_1983.html?id=eaVPAAAAMAAJ|title=Jess, Paste Ups (and Assemblies), 1951-1983|access-date=2025-10-07|website=books.google.com}}</ref>
*''Jess: A Grand Collage, 1951-1993'', exhibition catalogue. Buffalo Fine Arts/Albright Knox Art Gallery, 1993. {{ISBN|0-914782-85-1}}
*''Jess: To and From the Printed Page'', exhibition catalogue, text by [[John Ashbery]], Thomas Evans, and [[Lisa Jarnot]]. Independent Curators International, 2007. {{ISBN|0-916365-75-1}}
*''O! Tricky Cad & Other Jessoterica'', edited by Michael Duncan. Siglio, 2012. {{ISBN|978-1-938221-00-2}}


==References==
==References==
Line 53: Line 87:


==Further reading==
==Further reading==
*''O! Tricky Cad & Other Jessoterica''. Edited by Michael Duncan. (Siglio, 2012) {{ISBN|978-1-938221-00-2}}
*de Sousa, Mary Porter; de Sousa, Luís Amorim; and Maynard, James, editors. ''Such Conjunctions: Robert Duncan, Jess, and [[Alberto de Lacerda]]'', BlazeVOX, 2014.
*''Jess: To and From the Printed Page''. [[John Ashbery]], Thomas Evans, [[Lisa Jarnot]]; (Independent Curators International, 2007) {{ISBN|0-916365-75-1}}
*Duncan, Michael and Wagstaff, Christopher. ''An Opening of the Field: Jess, Robert Duncan and their Circle'', Pomegranite , 2013.
*''Jess, a Grand Collage, 1951-1993''. (Buffalo Fine Arts / Albright Knox Art Gallery, 1993) {{ISBN|0-914782-85-1}}
*Kuspit, Donald. "Jess," ''Arforum'', December, 2020.
*McDowell, Tara. ''The Householders: Robert Duncan and Jess'', MIT Press, 2019.
*Marcus, Greil. "Dream House: Jess’s Murals," ''Artforum'', November 2014.
*Rogers, Michael. "Pulled Through Time: a Caltech Reporter Traces the Life of an Elusive Artist," ''Caltech News'', Vol. 41, Num. 4, 2007.
*Rudick, Nicole. “Paste-ups,” ''The Paris Review'', No. 202, Fall 2012.


==External links==
==External links==
*[http://jesscollins.org/ Jess Collins Trust]
*[http://jesscollins.org/ Jess Collins Trust]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20070927063648/http://www.sfai.edu/People/Person.aspx?id=147&navID=6&sectionID=2&typeID=1 San Francisco Art Institute: Jess Collins, BFA 1951] from San Francisco Chronicle, January 7, 2004 [http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2004/01/07/BAGIC44V2V1.DTL] by Kenneth Baker
*[https://www.tibordenagy.com/artists/estate-of-jess Estate of Jess] pages at the website of the Tibor de Nagy gallery, including bio, curriculum vitae, and image galleries from the Jess exhibits [https://www.tibordenagy.com/exhibitions/jess6 Secret Compartments] (2018), [https://www.tibordenagy.com/exhibitions/jess5 Movie Posters and Other Works] (2016), [https://www.tibordenagy.com/exhibitions/jess4 Looking Past Seeing Through] (2014), [https://www.tibordenagy.com/exhibitions/jess3 Paintings] (2012), [https://www.tibordenagy.com/exhibitions/jess2 Paste-Ups] (2009), and [https://www.tibordenagy.com/exhibitions/jess Paintings and Paste-Ups] (2008)
*[http://www.askart.com/askart/j/burgess_collins_jess/burgess_collins_jess.aspx Ask/ART: Jess]
*[http://www.askart.com/askart/j/burgess_collins_jess/burgess_collins_jess.aspx Ask/ART: Jess]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20060907032811/http://ici-exhibitions.org/Exhibitions/jess/jess.html ''Jess: To and From the Printed Page''] exhibition of Jess's [[impastos]] from his "Translation" series together with many of his collages and designs, as well as the books and magazines in which they were reproduced
*[http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt4r29q8b4/ Guide to the Jess Papers] at [[The Bancroft Library]]
*[http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt4r29q8b4/ Guide to the Jess Papers] at [[The Bancroft Library]]
*[http://pr.caltech.edu/periodicals/caltechnews/articles/v41/jess.html Pulled Through Time: A "Caltech News" Reporter Traces the Life of an Elusive Artist]
*[http://sigliopress.com/about-jess/ Jess: Master of Collage Aesthetic] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150225021329/http://sigliopress.com/about-jess/ |date=2015-02-25 }} by Michael Duncan at Siglio Press
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120331032329/http://www.gallerypauleanglim.com/Gallery_Paule_Anglim/Jess.html Gallery Paule Anglim]
*[http://sigliopress.com/about-jess/ "Jess: Master of Collage Aesthetic"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150225021329/http://sigliopress.com/about-jess/ |date=2015-02-25 }} by Michael Duncan at Siglio Press


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Latest revision as of 09:10, 13 December 2025

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Jess Collins (August 6, 1923 – January 2, 2004), known today simply as Jess, was an American visual artist.

Life and career

Jess was born Burgess Franklin Collins in Long Beach, California. He was drafted into the military and worked on the production of plutonium for the Manhattan Project.[1] After his discharge in 1946, Jess worked at the Hanford Atomic Energy Project in Richland, Washington, and painted in his spare time, but his dismay at the threat of atomic weapons led him to abandon his scientific career and focus on his art.

In 1949, Jess enrolled in the California School of the Arts (subsequently the San Francisco Art Institute) where he studied under Clyfford Still, David Park, Hassel Smith, and Edward Corbett. He received a BFA degree in 1951. in 1949 he broke with his family, and thereafter referred to himself simply as "Jess."[1][2]

He met Robert Duncan in 1950 and began a relationship with the poet that lasted for 37 years until Duncan's death in 1988. The two men lived and worked for decades from their historic Victorian home in the Mission District, "a wonderland of an old house, filled to the roof with art," more than 5,000 books, and 5,300 music records.[3][1][4] Through Duncan and the painter Lyn Brockway he became active in numerous exhibitions, poetry gatherings, and creative endeavors.

In 1952, in San Francisco, Jess, with Duncan and painter Harry Jacobus, opened the King Ubu Gallery, which became an important venue for alternative art and which remained so when, in 1954, poet Jack Spicer reopened the space as the Six Gallery.

In the late 1950s, Jess filled Pauline Kael's home on Oregon Street in Berkeley, California, with fantastical murals which still adorn the walls today.[5][6][7]

Many of Jess's works have themes drawn from chemistry, alchemy, the occult, and male beauty, including a series of paintings called Translations (1959–1976) which is done with heavily laid-on paint in a paint-by-number style. Jess also created elaborate collages using old book illustrations and comic strips (particularly, the strip Dick Tracy, which he used to make his own strip Tricky Cad).[8]

Art citic Holland Cotter identifies three distinct facets of Jess's artistic oeuvre.

He started out doing shadowy abstract paintings, influenced by his teacher, Edward Corbett...It wasn’t long before Jess developed a technique that was better suited to his gift for meditative, labor-intensive precision: paintings with thickly layered surfaces from which images seemed to be incised...Jess is best known for his collages, which he called paste-ups: staggeringly intricate symbolic narratives pieced together from bits of scientific treatises, muscle magazines, art history books, cartoons and popular periodicals like Life and Time.[3]

Harry Parker, director of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, called Jess "the essential San Francisco artist. His political views and his quirky artistic style, his association with the poetry scene, his advocacy of gay rights—all the issues that came into his work were so representative of the San Francisco perspective. Only here could you imagine work like his being made."[2]

The year 2019 saw the publication of The Householders: Robert Duncan and Jess by Tara McDowell (MIT Press), the first book-length study of the couple, a work of both biography and critical analysis, and, in the words of the press release, "a love story."[9]

Exhibitions

At mid-career, Jess's art received international attention with solo exhibitions at the The Museum of Modern Art in New York (1974), the Galleria Odyssia in Rome (1975), the Wadsworth Atheneum[10] (1975), the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts (1977), the Berkeley Art Museum (1980), and The Arts Club of Chicago (1981).[11]

In 1983-84, the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota, Florida mounted the exhibition Jess, Paste-Ups (and Assemblies), 1951-1983 and published a companion book.[12][13]

A Jess retrospective, Jess: A Grand Collage, 1951–1993, toured the United States in 1993 to 1994. The companion book featured essays by contributors including poet Michael Palmer, who wrote an extended piece on Jess's monumental Narkissos, a complexly rendered 70"x60" drawing (graphite and gouache on cut and pasted paper) acquired in 1996 by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.[1]

In 2004, three details from Jess's monumental collage Arkadia's Last Resort; or, Fête Champêtre Up Mnemosyne Creek[14] were used by Faithless to illustrate their release "I Want More."

From 2007 to 2009, the posthumous traveling exhibition Jess: To and From the Printed Page included paintings from his Translations series together with many of his collages and designs, as well as the books and magazines in which they were reproduced. The exhibition appeared at the San Jose Museum of Art, the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, the Pasadena Museum of California Art, the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin, the Douglas F. Cooley Gallery at Reed College, the University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art, and the Rollins Museum of Art at Rollins College.[15]

In 2014 and 2015, the traveling exhibition An Opening of the Field: Jess, Robert Duncan, and Their Circle appeared at the Grey Art Gallery at New York University, the Katzen Arts Center at American University in Washington, D.C., and the Pasadena Museum of California Art. As Holland Cotter wrote in The New York Times, the exhibition explored what it was like for the couple to be "young, gifted, and odd" in San Francisco after World War II. "Espousers of the power of the imagination," Jess and Duncan "created a self-contained world, and their friends were welcomed in." Combining 45 of the couple's own works with 85 works by roughly 30 of their close associates, the show shed light on what was less a movement than a "psychic collaboration, the communal property of lovers, spouses, and friends....Maybe the sense of unity [in the exhibition] comes from the presence of a marriage at its center, a same-sex union that lasted almost 40 years."[3][16]

In 2019, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art mounted the show Mythos, Psyche, Eros: Jess and California, which paired paintings and collages "that privileged the mystical, whimsical, and absurd" by "one of San Francisco’s most enigmatic figures...with pieces by other California artists, who together reflect the West Coast’s unusual romantic legacy."[17]

In museum collections

Papers

The Jess Papers collection is stored at the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and consists of correspondence, manuscripts, flyers, announcements, clippings, writings, artwork, and miscellaneous materials.[29]

Publications

  • Jess, Paste Ups (and Assemblies), 1951-1983, exhibition catalogue, text by Michael Auping. John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, 1983.[30]
  • Jess: A Grand Collage, 1951-1993, exhibition catalogue. Buffalo Fine Arts/Albright Knox Art Gallery, 1993. Template:ISBN
  • Jess: To and From the Printed Page, exhibition catalogue, text by John Ashbery, Thomas Evans, and Lisa Jarnot. Independent Curators International, 2007. Template:ISBN
  • O! Tricky Cad & Other Jessoterica, edited by Michael Duncan. Siglio, 2012. Template:ISBN

References

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Further reading

  • de Sousa, Mary Porter; de Sousa, Luís Amorim; and Maynard, James, editors. Such Conjunctions: Robert Duncan, Jess, and Alberto de Lacerda, BlazeVOX, 2014.
  • Duncan, Michael and Wagstaff, Christopher. An Opening of the Field: Jess, Robert Duncan and their Circle, Pomegranite , 2013.
  • Kuspit, Donald. "Jess," Arforum, December, 2020.
  • McDowell, Tara. The Householders: Robert Duncan and Jess, MIT Press, 2019.
  • Marcus, Greil. "Dream House: Jess’s Murals," Artforum, November 2014.
  • Rogers, Michael. "Pulled Through Time: a Caltech Reporter Traces the Life of an Elusive Artist," Caltech News, Vol. 41, Num. 4, 2007.
  • Rudick, Nicole. “Paste-ups,” The Paris Review, No. 202, Fall 2012.

External links

Template:Authority control

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