John Hafen: Utahs Aesthetic Conscience

(Hardback)

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A meticulously researched, comprehensive biography showcasing the work of Utah artist John Hafen, including over 200 images of the artist's work, along with 50+ photos and historical clippings.

A meticulously researched, comprehensive biography showcasing the work of Utah artist John Hafen, including over 200 images of the artist's work, along with 50+ photos and historical clippings.

John Hafen (1856-1910) was a Mormon artist in a philosophical and evangelical sense; he was not a painter of Christian and Latter-day Saint genre, themes, or content. He was not a painter of a vision of his own day and age, but rather he searched for the universal and eternal beauty underlying rural nature. While he vigorously eschewed commercialism in art, because of dire poverty and large family he was continually "forced" to paint easy and quick pictures for trade just to get by from day to day. But taken all together, he was the clearest voice of the aesthetic conscience of Utah art. His capa d'opera was the equal of the best Utah artists and fares well nationally. He founded the Springville Museum of Art in 1903.

Author Bio

Vern Grosvenor Swanson, PhD, studied at BYU and the University of Utah, and received his doctorate at the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London. He was the museum aide supervisor at the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., and director of the Springville Museum of Art for thirty-two years until his retirement in 2012. His authored publications include J.W. Godward: The Eclipse of Classicism, as well as two major books on Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, five books on Russian and Soviet art, six books on Utah painting and sculpture, and two books on LDS theology. He lives in Springville, Utah, with his wife, Judy.

Angela Swanson Jones, MA, is a graduate of BYU and holds an MA from the Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London. She serves as exhibition director of the International Art Renewal Center Salon. Angela has published articles with Fine Art Connoisseur and has co-authored the books Desperately Young: Artists Who Died in their Twenties and Dictionary of Utah Fine Artists. Currently, she is writing the biography and catalogue raisonn on the German painter Heinrich Hofmann (1824-1911). After living in Europe for ten years, Angela resides in Fairview, Texas, with her husband, Jason, and three children.