Talk:Robert Lepper

Recent edits

It appears that new content is being inserted in the midst of cited content... but the new content is not from the cited source. For instance, there's a lot of new content, but not one new source. If I am interpreting incorrectly, though, please reply.--CaroleHenson (talk) 01:17, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Neither Herbert A. Simon nor Richard Rappaport influenced Lepper's interest in the impact of the machine on society. That statement in Simon's wikipedia was added incorrectly. Simon was respectful of Lepper only. Simon came to Carnegie Tech around 1947 and Rappaport, yours truly, studied with Lepper in 1965. Lepper was at that point fully engaged with the concept of the impact both of the machine and media on society long before that and in 1947 was formulating that concept to Warhol and Pearlstein (who was Lepper's assistant after school hours. And I knew Herbert Simon almost as well as I knew Lepper, painting portraits of both in 1987. Simon's portrait also can be found on Richard Rappaport/Wikimedia Commons.

The material added was by me and reflects what I had written in "Robert Lepper, Carnegie Tech, and the Oakland Project", a copy of which Lepper left with his papers at the faculty archive of Carnegie Mellon University, as a sign of his approval for its authenticity. The paper ia also in the archives of MoMA. Columbia, Princeton, and the Art Institute of Chicago, with on-line access to MoMA's. I also know personnaly Philip Pearlstein, who at the Warhol Symposium at the Carnegie Museum in 1989 mentioned in his part of the program of his working with Lepper in the evenings and in meeting up with Warhol going over Lepper's discussions - making Pearlstein the conduit of Lepper's ideas to Warhol. Pearlstein's manner of objectifying the human body also can be linked to Lepper's injunction of "communication as intention expressed and followed logically." I also know Mel Bochner and Jonathan Borofsky. Jonathan didn't officially take Lepper's classes, but being a sculpture major was always working close by Lepper in the evenings, and as Lepper always shared his ideas, both formal and theoretical, Jonathan has informally spoken of Lepper's influence on him; while Mel Bochner was Lepper's pride and joy, and Bochner continued to visit Lepper whenever he was in Pittsburgh for many years after graduating. I personnally gave Bochner rides to the campus in the evenings of 1963/1964 school year when Bochner returned to teach in the Pittsburgh School system. Working in the print room, Bochner would often go visiting Lepper and on returning share his enthusiasm for Lepper's theoretical speculations on the potential of art pratice with me. The following year I took Lepper's class along with my closest buddy at that time, John Lilly (who later gave up being an artist but did become a fabricator for Borofsky's sculptures in L.A.) was a sculpture student already bonded with Lepper - so I became the third member of our little group for the next two years with Lepper initiating dialogues that years later I wove together my understanding of his influence on Bochner and consequently Conceptual art practice. That is why I describe Lepper as a "proto-Conceptualist concerned with the act of conceptualizing." The term was't coined when Lepper introduced that possible strategy to Bochner. That Mel Bochner has never acknowledged his enormous debt to Lepper's theoretical mentoring is a shame and a disgrace, for Lepper's importance goes well beyond his setting up the industrial design program at Carnegie Tech (which in 1967 became Carnegie Mellon University). Lepper's work in industrial design and his Bauhaus leanings were the foundation to his developing his own theories on where art could go, and in fostering such dialogues, often outside the classroom, Lepper influenced the above mentioned artists who were his closest, most capable students, which suggests that Lepper should be ranked with the most influential teachers and theorists of art in mid-Twentieth Century. Consequently, Lepper should be described as a "theorist" as well as an artist and teacher.

Chapter 8, Book 2 of my memoir "Portraits & Passages", www.richard-rappaport.net has added information (along with reproductions of two sheets of drawings with multiple views of Lepper that I drew in 1965 or 1966) as does "Robert Lepper/Six Characters in Search" attached to my memoir, written in 2008. But the majority of what I had added to Lepper's Wikipedia article is simply a more detailed explanation of how and what he presented to his students for "The Oakland Project" and "The Retrospective". "Let the subconscious take the intiative" and "Let it be" are Lepper's exact precepts for "The Retrospective".

It's not important to have my painting mentioned in reference to "The Retrospective". It only suggests my close association to him and his openness to a broad range of artistic approaches which was the reason for the two distinctly different goals of the two classes - one looking to the outside world and the other to one's inside world. The rest of what I had written gives a fuller accounting to these classes and to a man neglected so far by contemporary criticism. At seventy I am one of the very few who can address this.

Thank you for your understanding,

Richard Rappaport, February 2, 2014 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.60.19.64 (talk) 22:08, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but this is so long I'm not quite sure what your points are and what you'd like to have done. I am getting that you have first-hand knowledge, which in this case is synonymous with WP:Original research or WP:Original thought and it's much better to get secondary sources for the information.

I am getting that you are disputing some of the information in the article, which is good to clarify. What we'll need to do is either 1) remove the disputed info or 2) find a source to correct the information.

Does that help clarify what's needed to make the next step?--CaroleHenson (talk) 00:41, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Dear Carole Hanson: I have added to the beginning statement on Lepper what I believe is his most significant reason to be on Wikipedia. I don't know how to put in the reference which should be my 1989 paper "Robert Lepper, Carnegie Tech, and the Oakland Project". The trouble we are having here is that there really are no secondary sources, or none with substance. That should not be reason enough not to insert what is most essential to Lepper's standing - his influence on these artists whose work has made such an impact on contemporary art. Thank you, Richard Rappaport, February 6,2014. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.60.19.64 (talk) 18:58, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Ok, I took care of it. Thanks!--CaroleHenson (talk) 20:27, 6 February 2014 (UTC)