John Ford

John Ford (1894 - 1973)

Director
Poet
Mystical Artist

“My names John Ford. I make Westerns”

John Ford was one of the most remarkable artists produced by the cinematic arts and his list of admirer colleagues is a who’s who of great directors, not only American, but British, Italian, French, German and even Japanese. And yet this towering talent, this mystical poet of film, was one of the most enigmatic, troubled, brooding men of his profession and even today remains as elusive as a person as he was brilliant an artist.

Born John Martin Feeney to devout Irish Catholic immigrants in Maine, Feeney had developed a love not only for the sea (he remained a lifelong naval officer and sailor) but for art, literature and the beauty of nature, all of which he buried below a crusty façade of bullish aggression and machismo. Following his elder brother Francis (who changed their name from Feeney to Ford) to Hollywood in 1914, he apprenticed as a gofer, stuntman and occasional actor in his brothers highly popular serials and melodramas.

In 1917 Ford (known then as “Jack”) directed his first feature length film, Straight Shooting with silent Western star Harry Carey. It was the beginning of a lifetime association with “intellectual” and “philosophical” westerns exploring the nature of the solitary outsider against a hostile and rugged existential terrain. The path he blazed with Carey would continue with a succession of strong, silent He-Men such as George O’Brien, Victor McLaglen, Henry Fonda as well as his greatest discovery and collaborator, John Wayne.

In the 1920s Ford became enamored with the imported school of Expressionism, especially the films of the German F.W. Murnau and he began to experiment with the style and even employed it to great psychological effect in his Westerns, ranging from Stagecoach (1939), My Darling Clementine (1948), The Searchers (1956) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962). Despite his notorious reputation for pettiness, vengeance, rage and corrosive alcoholism (which he struggled with his entire life) Ford had a deeply sentimental and compassionate side to him which was reflected in the achingly beautiful compositions and the themes that were the leitmotifs in his greatest films.

Ford’s Irish Catholicism was not simply an adjunct of his life but a deep wellspring from which he drew his existential worldview and themes such as the sacramental centrality of the meal, the benevolent love of a patriarch, the nurturing strength of a mother and the abiding presence of the dead (the communion of saints) recur again and again in Ford’s mature films. He served in both theaters of war in World War II, filmed the Battle of Midway and eventually earned the naval rank of rear admiral. Patriotism, duty, courage, honor and a fierce love of America also became a benchmark of his films.

Ford won four Academy Awards for his directorial work: The Informer (1935), The Grapes of Wrath (1940), How Green Was My Valley (1941) and The Quiet Man (1952). Technically, he won six, as he was awarded two more for short subject films made during the war. John Ford died of cancer in 1973.

The John Ford tile was created in 2021. Our 12" X 12" signed and numbered reproduction is created on stretch canvas and is suitable for matting and framing.