Joseph Cornell: Uncommon Artist

Joseph Cornell was an uncommon artist from the twentieth century who created an enormous amount of compositions through the art of collaging. Cornell, a New York native, patterned his works of art after the European design of art also known as “Surrealism.” In the early 1930’s, Joseph Cornell began his career as an artist, while still being a working class American citizen, his artworks were quite low budget. He began his career by creating his art with found objects from the city along with displaying them in wooden boxes. When he first began creating his themed compositions, he started by creating three dimensional works, later in his career, he began using the two dimensional effect without the box frameworks. However, he also had a hand in
creating experimental films through is compositions.
Joseph Cornell was born on December 25, 1903 in Nyack, New York.
He was born into a family where his father was a craftsman and a singer. Cornell’s father traveled a great deal and would often bring home surprises to Joseph and his siblings, whether it was a pocket full of candies or found objects when he returned home. On the other hand, Joseph’s mother was a kindergarten teacher, who extended her knowledge of teaching to her own children, including Joseph. Foremost, under his father’s guidance, Cornell learned a great deal of knowledge from his father’s craftsmanship, which allowed Joseph to be familiar with carpentry. By having firsthand knowledge of woodwork, it was useful to him when he began making his wooden boxes for his “shadow box” art pieces. Sadly, Joseph lost his father at the age of ten, yet this did not stop him from furthering his education at The Phillip’s Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. While at the Academy Joseph received his secondary education, however he never received any training in art. In the beginnings of Cornell’s career as an artist he was known not to be one who is great in drawing or in painting. Cornell’s talents began in three dimensional works which later evolved into other
works.
After the death of Joseph’s father, Joseph and his siblings and mother moved to Queens, New York. While living in Queens, Joseph made his permanent home in there until his death in 1972. As a young man, Joseph began to support his mother and a brother, who had cerebral palsy, by working at a factory in Manhattan. There he began to collect found objects and printed images to use for his composition. He collected these found items from bargain stores, thrift shops or wherever he could. Joseph began creating toys to entertain his disabled brother, whom he loved dearly. In the early 1930’s, Joseph began creating art with themed boxes with related items. Later in the 1950’s his art patterns really did not change except for he began creating these items in two dimensional forms and he did not use any borders around his works. He also began to paint murals Although, Cornell was not very popular during his time, he was fortunate to make contact with some galleries in the area of Manhattan. He also created narrative films, to showcase his works. However, his works were not known as a surrealist during his time because his works illustrated memories instead of unconscious ones. During his time, Joseph chose to go with the changing world of art and use the surrealist Dada ideas a European movement that followed the new American based abstract ideas during the World War I. Today, Joseph’s works can be found in several of New York’s American Museum of art.