"The be an artist you have to give up everything, including the desire to be a good artist." - Jasper Johns
"In the late 1950's Jasper Johns emerged as a force in the American Art scene. His richly worked paintings of map, flags and targets led the artistic community away from the Abstract Impressionism toward a new emphasis on the concrete. John's laid the groundwork for both Pop art and Minimalism...
Born in Augusta, Georgia and raised in Allendale, South Carolina, Jasper Johns grew up wanting to be an artist....He studied briefly at the University of South Carolina before moving to New York.
In New York Johns met a number of artists including John Cage, the choreographer Merce Cunningham,
and the painter Robert Rauschenberg. While working together creating window displays for Tiffany's Johns and Rauschenberg explored the New York art scene. After a visit to Philadelphia to see Marcel Duchamp's painting "The Large Glass" (1915-23), Johns became very interested in his work. Duchamp had revolutionized the art worlk with his "ready mades" - a series of found objects presented as finished works of art. This irreverance for the fixed attitudes toward what could be considered works of art was a substantial influence on Johns.
The modern art community was searching for new ideas to succeed the pure emotionality of Abstract Impressionists. Johns' painting of targets, maps, invited both the wrath and praise of art critics. Johns' early works combined a serious concern for the craft of painting with an everyday, almost absurd, subject matter. The meaning of the painting could be found in the painting process itself. Johns explained, " There may or may not be an idea, and the meaning may just be that the painting exists."
In 1958, gallery owner Leo Castelli, visited Rauschenberg's studio, and saw Johns work for the first time. Castelli was so impressed,with the 28 year olds ability and inventiveness that he offered him a show on the spot. At that first exhibition, the Museum of Modern Art purchased three pieces, making it clear that Johns was to become a major force in the art world. Thirty years later his paintings sold for more than any living artist in history." ....
The full article taken may be found here:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/jasper-johns-about-the-painter/54/
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