DINES CARLSEN (1901-1966)
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Biography • Dines Carlsen (1901-1966)
Dines Carlsen, son of the artist Emil Carlsen, was born in New York on March 28, 1901. 1901 was the year that Emil Carlsen was elected a member of the Society of American Artists and the Salmagundi Club and began to achieve real success as a painter of still lifes, marines, portraits, and landscapes. The family home and studio in New York City was at 43 East 59th Street until 1932 when Emil died.
As a pupil of his father, Dines showed a great proficiency for painting at an early age. At twelve years old Dines traveled with his parents to London, Europe, Scandinavia and the Virgin Islands visiting collections and artists’ studios. In 1915 Dines began to exhibit still lifes, landscapes, and portraits in large international shows. Dines was invited to exhibit in the 91st Annual Exhibition of the National Academy of Design in 1915, exhibiting two still life paintings The Chocolate Pot and Gray Still Life. In 1916, Dines Carlsen exhibited a landscape titled Pine Woods at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Annual. Dines Carlsen continued to send paintings to the National Academy of Design until 1949 and to the Pennsylvania Academy until 1933. He was also invited to exhibit at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. from 1916 to 1926 and the Art Institute of Chicago from 1920-1930.
Dines Carlsen’s still life subjects were a strong focus from 1915 to 1924. In them he focuses on the play of light: on common kitchen utensils, on reflective objects of pewter, copper or brass, and on elegant polished surfaces of oriental objects. The backgrounds of these still life paintings were executed with short stitch-like strokes in high key colors.
About 1905 the Carlsen family built a studio in Falls Village, Connecticut. Summers were spent in Falls Village, the location of many landscape subjects for Dines like Pines on the Hillside (exhibited at the National Academy of Design in 1918). In the 1920s Dines Carlsen began to explore subjects like Steam Pipe Repair Crew to capture the rebuilding and repairs that are a constant feature of Manhattan life. As in his still life paintings and landscapes, Dines concentrated on light and atmosphere in these rare urban subjects. Their backgrounds also contain Dine’s characteristic short stitch-like strokes and high key post-Impressionist palette. During his career as an artist, Dines also painted local scenes in the Berkshires, Maine, Mexico, and the Southwest. After his father’s death in 1932, Dines lived full time in Falls Village, Connecticut and wintered at his home in Summerville, South Carolina.
Dines Carlsen exhibited regularly over thirty years in both group exhibitions and one-man shows. His dealers during his lifetime were Macbeth Galleries and Grand Central Galleries in New York. In 1929 Macbeth Galleries organized a two-man exhibition for father and son. The Grand Central Art Galleries held a joint retrospective honoring the work of Emil and Dines Carlsen in 1968. Dines Carlsen was made an Associate of the National Academy in 1922 and Academician in 1941. He died on October 1, 1966, in St. Luke’s Hospital, New York.