James Hampton’s “Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations’ Millennium General Assembly”

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Anthony Pfau Art Appreciation Week 2 (Jan. 9-15) Web Research Essay James Hampton’s “Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations’ Millennium General Assembly” The “Throne of the Third Heaven…” by James Hampton, is a striking piece of work by an untrained artist of this century. The art work is derived of gold and silver aluminum foil, colored Kraft paper, plastic sheets over wood, paperboard and glass.1 James Hampton built this art in his garage. It took him about fourteen years to complete. He took home furniture and various other objects he found and covered them up with the aluminum foil. The image definitely jumps out at me. Other than being so big, it looks like something ancient and magical. It looks like something a king or pharaoh would have in ancient Egypt. There is definitely a story told here, or rather symbolic reference to it. James was a Baptist minister. He believed after reading Revelations in the Bible, that the second coming of Jesus was coming soon and that Jesus would need a throne. This artwork depicts a beautiful and majestic throne fit for a king, especially “The King of Kings.” “Art by untrained artists, also called naïve or outsider artists, is made by people who are largely unaware of art history or the art trends of their time. Unlike folk art, which is made by people working within a tradition, art by untrained artists is personal expression created apart from any conventional practice or style.” (Artforms) 1 I believe Hampton to be an untrained artist. “Untrained artists create pieces of work based on their own creativity, and in earlier times was attributed to art created by the mentally ill. Today, it’s mostly used as a hipster term to describe anything on the fringes of the artistic community by untrained artists, but it still bears the stigma, based on the term ‘outsider’, of being excluded from the genuine art

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