Archives of American Art

Oral history interview with Lee Mullican

Summary

Collection ID:
AAA.mullic92
Creators:
Mullican, Lee, 1919-1998
Karlstrom, Paul J.
Dates:
1992 May 22-1993 Mar. 4
Languages:
English
.
Physical Description:
160 Pages
Transcript
Repository:

Scope and Contents

Scope and Contents
An interview of Lee Mullican conducted 1992 May 22-1993 Mar. 4, by Paul Karlstrom for the Archives of American Art, at the artist's home/studio in Santa Monica, Calif.
Scope and Contents
Mullican speaks of his family background, childhood, and his first introductions to art; the influence of abstraction and surrealism in his work; his studies at Abilene College, University of Oklahoma, and the Kansas City Art Institute; his service in WWII; his interest in French painting, theater, opera and ballet; meeting Jack Stauffacher; the influence of Wolfgang Paalen in Mexico; and the connection between modern and primitive, and tribal art, especially in the American Indians of Mexico. He discusses his arrival in San Francisco and the art world and lifestyle there; the Dynaton group; early years in Los Angeles; his trip and exhibition in Rome; UCLA politics; his relationship to modernism and place in American art; regionalism; and the mystical and transcendental expressed in his work. He recalls Gordon Onslow-Ford, Jack Stauffacher, Peggy Guggenheim, Rachel Rosenthal, Richard Diebenkorn, David Hockney, Ed Moses, Isamu Noguchi, Sibyl Moholy-Nagy, and others.

Biographical / Historical

Biographical / Historical
Lee Mullican (1919-1998) was a painter from San Francisco and Santa Monica, Calif.

Administration

Sponsor
Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
These interviews are part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators. Funding for this interview was provided by the Lannan Foundation.

Digital Content


Using the Collection

Conditions Governing Access
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.

More Information

General

General
Originally recorded on 8 sound cassettes. Reformatted in 2010 as 14 digital wav files. Duration is 7 hrs., 4 min.


Keywords

Keywords table of terms and types.
Keyword Terms Keyword Types
Art, Modern -- 20th century -- California Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Painters -- California -- Santa Monica -- Interviews Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Dynaton (Group of artists) Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Interviews Genre Form Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Sound recordings Genre Form Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Diebenkorn, Richard, 1922-1993 Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Guggenheim, Peggy, 1898-1979 Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Hockney, David Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Moholy-Nagy, Sibyl, 1905- Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Moses, Ed, 1926- Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Noguchi, Isamu, 1904-1988 Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Onslow-Ford, Gordon Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Paalen, Wolfgang, 1907- Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Rosenthal, Rachel, 1926- Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Stauffacher, Jack Werner Personal Name Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid

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