Locks Gallery is pleased to present Robert Motherwell: Paintings, from October 20 through November 13, 2010. There will be a reception on Friday, November 5th, from 5:30 to 7:30pm. The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalog.
A seminal figure among the Abstract Expressionists, Robert Motherwell (1915-1991) was also a writer and philosopher of abstract painting in post-war America. His paintings and theoretical approach forever shaped the formal discourse of his era.
Motherwell’s earliest exhibits occurred while still a graduate student in art history at Columbia University. He left a scholarly path to pursue painting full time in 1941. Motherwell’s prominence on the New York scene coincided with the fabled convergence of a new momentum in American-led abstraction - presented by forward-thinking curators at MoMA and The Whitney Museum of Art, and such galleries as Art of This Century, Samuel Kootz and Sidney Janis. All exhibited Motherwell’s paintings during this time.
The Locks Gallery exhibit will feature a selection of the artist’s paintings dating from the late 1940s and 1950s - a period when critical attention worldwide had acknowledged the importance of Abstract Expressionism. Several works from his Spanish Elegies series will be exhibited. Paintings from his series, Beside the Sea, developed at his studio in Provincetown, Massachusetts will also be included.
Motherwell’s work is represented in museum collections throughout the world. During his lifetime his work was the subject of solo exhibitions and traveling retrospectives in all the major centers of modern and contemporary art.
Locks Gallery has previously organized exhibits of the artist’s work in 1989, 1992, 1995, 1997, and 2000. This will be the largest presentation of his paintings in Philadelphia since the 1992 exhibit.
