When not performing on stage, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame singer/songwriter John Mellencamp is often painting, as seen below in his art studio in New York City. The Indiana native has been an accomplished painter for more than four decades.
An exhibition of Mellencamp’s oil paintings and mixed-media assemblages is currently on view at the New York Academy of Art until November 15, 2022.
[Below: John Mellencamp, Out The Window 16” x 12” House Paint, Oil on Masonite]
[Below: John Mellencamp, Pretty Peggy, 2019, 55 1/2 x 55 1/2 Mixed Media]
Rizzoli is publishing a coffee table book featuring Mellencamp’s works, John Mellencamp: American Paintings and Assemblages, available October 18. Mellencamp says he curated the book himself and chose several self-portraits and portraits of other famous friends including the late great Johnny Cash and his ex-fiancee, Hollywood movie star Meg Ryan, among others.
Former Spin magazine publisher Bob Guccione, Jr. writes in the forward of the book: “Although we may primarily know Mellencamp as a rock star, one of the highest-selling of all time and a Hall of Famer, he is also a great painter, as this book shows. Not a musician who also paints… No, John legitimately belongs in the modern art pantheon.”
Dr. Louis A. Zona, executive director and chief curator of the Butler Institute of American Art, and David L. Shirey, former New York Times critic and former chair of the MFA Fine Arts program at the School of Visual Arts, contribute to the editorial content of Mellencamp’s art book.
P.S. John Mellencamp just announced his 2023 music tour, Live & In Person, which includes three nights in June at New York City’s Beacon Theater.
