Keinholz and the No-name Dog

Edward Keinholz was a major influence along with his fellow environmental figurative artist, George Segal on the formation of my personal artistic viewpoint. This piece “Keinholz and the No Name Dog” documents the first thirty years of his successful career. I have chosen three pieces that date from the 1960’s, 1970’s, and 1980’s to exemplify this creative rebel’s career. The first piece “Barney’s Beanery” from 1965 was a faithful reproduction of the famed Los Angeles dive. The piece had ten life-size figures each with a clock face with the hands stopped at 10 minutes after 10. In my sculpture I used the clock faces as a halo surrounding the head of Keinholz as in the Eastern European paintings of icons. The second piece “Sollie 17” from the late seventies was a voyeuristic look into a SRO Hotel room. In Keinholz’s sculpture you may only view the interior of the disheveled hotel room with Sollie sitting on the bed through a partially opened door from the corridor. I have used this image with the lower part figure of the artist partially hidden and seen in a like manner. In the 1980’s Keinholz along with his wife and collaborator Nancy Reddin moved away from direct reality and began to create more fantastical creatures in their pieces and the “No Name Dog” is an example of this work.