Jim Dine

About Jim Dine

Jim Dine (born June 16, 1935) is an American pop artist. He is sometimes considered to be a part of the Neo-Dada movement. He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, attended the University of Cincinnati and received a BFA from Ohio University in 1957. He first earned respect in the art world with his Happenings. Pioneered with artists Claes Oldenburg and Allan Kaprow, in conjunction with musician John Cage, the "Happenings" were chaotic performance art that was a stark contrast with the more somber mood of the expressionists popular in the New York art world. The first of these was the 30 second The Smiling Worker performed in 1959.

In 1962 Dine's work was included, along with Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, Robert Dowd, Phillip Hefferton, Joe Goode, Edward Ruscha, and Wayne Thiebaud, in the historically important and ground-breaking New Painting of Common Objects, curated by Walter Hopps at the Norton Simon Museum. This exhibition is historically considered one of the first "Pop Art" exhibitions in America. These painters started a movement, in a time of social unrest, which shocked America and the Art world and changed modern Art forever, "Pop Art".

In the early 1960s Dine produced pop art with items from everyday life. These provided commercial as well as critical success, but left Dine unsatisfied. In 1967 he moved to London, England where he was represented by the art dealer Robert Fraser, spending the next four years developing his art. Returning to the United States in 1971 he focused on several series of drawings. In the 1980s sculpture resumed a prominent place in his art. In the time since then there has been an apparent shift in the subject of his art from man-made objects to nature.