Appalachian Spring I

A beloved teacher at the Pennsylvania Academy from 1952 to 1979, Morris Blackburn (or "Blackie," as he was affectionately known by students and colleagues) was himself a student at the Academy from 1925 to 1929. The influence of Arthur B. Carles, under whom he trained, is apparent in the love of vibrant colors and geometric forms show here. From Daniel Garber, his other professor at the Academy, he developed a deep reverence for working outside - a practice he transmitted to his own students on sketching trips to the New Jersey shore, Pennsylvania fields, and New Mexico. Rather than representing a particular place, this dynamic composition pays tribute to the feelings evoked by music, specifically, the work of composer Aaron Copland. "Appalachian Spring," Copland's innovative orchestral suite that had premiered in 1944, successfully wedded modern rhythms to traditional American folk songs, much as Blackburn's painting happily combines the hard-edged Cubist forms of European modernism with more organic, biomorphic forms. The recipient of numerous prizes and veteran of dozens of solo exhibitions, Blackburn also taught at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and Temple University's Tyler School of Art, leaving his mark on a generation of Philadelphia artists. A watercolor version of the composition is also in the Academy's collection.