Paul Cadmus (1904–1999)

Written by: Laury

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(last updated April 24, 2011)

During his long life (95 years) american painter Paul Cadmus has always been actively involved in paintings and drawings, always looking for new ideas, new ways to express his art: a very seldom endless search. In the same time he has never hiden his homosexuality but has never been arrogant about it. He just wanted to be accepted as he was. He just wanted his paintings to be accepted as they were.

Paul Cadmus has painted 190 canvases: an average of 2.5 canvases per year. A low production because it takes rougthly 6 months to finish one. A lot of work was done around one canvase, some kind of draft for some parts.
The works of Paul Cadmus are in many American museums.

Unknown painter in 1934, he became famous overnight when a minor scandal erupted over his painting The Fleet’s In!
In painting, without ever moving away from figurative, his style ranges from realism, hyper-realism to caricature and symbolism. The design is detailed, the modeling and the prevailing contrast, color, though sometimes lively and noisy only plays a complementary role.

The style of Cadmus is strangely anachronistic. It is a mixture of neoclassical composition, brush strokes that are reminiscent of the Renaissance. Yet Cadmus’s work is never a simple borrowing of Renaissance painters. Instead, he mixes Renaissance forms with those of contemporary satire, creating a pictorial dialogue between classicism and American culture.

American painter Paul Cadmus is best known for the idealization of male bodies as an object of desire, for the
same-sex hominess celebration. Paul Cadmus was openly gay but kept it discreet. He has had several boy friends each relationships lasting for many years. Two relationships are known: one with Jared French from 1926 to 1933. Paul met Jared at Amherst College when he was 22 yo. They toured Europe together between 1931 and 1933 partly by bicycle, visiting all major museums. In 1937, French married artist Margaret Hoening, his and Cadmus’s mutual friend.

In 1963, Cadmus met Jon Andersson (27yo) a former cabaret singer who becomes the preferred model by the painter and shared his life for the last thirty years of his career.

In one of his latest drawings, a very moving image, Paul Cadmus has shown himself a haircut by his friend Jon Andersson. Their love story, the attitude of both courageous and no ostentatious were in fact a model for the gay community.