Film: Hans Hofmann
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The film Hans Hofmann by Sam Feinstein will be publicly released for the first time as a DVD insert in the monograph titled Sam Feinstein, published in May 2008. See "The Book"

The 30 minute documentary titled Hans Hofmann, a film which has yet to be released for distribution, was created as a collaboration between Hofmann and artist/director/producer Sam Feinstein during the summers of 1950-51. Together they wrote the narration while the filming and editing itself was completed as a solo venture by Feinstein. The focus of this black and white documentary is on the philosophy and principles of art as conveyed by Hofmann in his classes and writings, and as made evident in the process of his own painting. A ten minute sequence in the film shows Hofmann painting "The Window," a work now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. During the 1999 show of Hofmann's art at MMA, Feinstein's film was previewed to a standing-room-only crowd. Hofmann himself, in a letter to Feinstein dated 1965, stated:

     I hope you can complet (sic.) the realization of the great film about my scholarly and artistic activity that did so much engage your time and creative energy.
     I am totally in simpathy (sic.) with the entire film.
Most sincerely,     
Hans Hofmann     

As a student of Hofmann’s from 1949 through 1952, Sam Feinstein arrived with fifteen years experience as an academically trained painter and art teacher including the supervision of classes at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and instructing at Pratt Institute.  His filmmaking credentials included work completed for the Surgeon General’s Office of the US Army during WW II, the United Nations, the Film Board of Canada and the Federation of Atomic Scientists.  Feinstein was drawn to Hofmann’s class in order “to recharge” his own painting, which was ultimately shown beside that of Hofmann.  They became friends and were neighbors in Provincetown throughout the 1950s, and together served on the modern jury for the Provincetown Art Association’s annual show in 1956. Feinstein was a contributing editor to Art Digest during the mid-1950s as well as writing, at Hofmann’s request, an analysis of Hofmann’s work for the Kootz Gallery which Kootz later called “prophetic.”  Feinstein died in 2003 after spending the last forty years of his life privately teaching and painting with radiant color-forms in a continuation and expansion of the Hofmann tradition.

For further information: See Contacts