SAM GILLIAM
CONNERSMITH is pleased to announce REUNION, an exhibition of Washington Color paintings by Sam Gilliam, Alma Thomas, Howard Mehring, Thomas Downing, Gene Davis, and Hilda Shapiro Thorpe.
Selected works, from the mid 1950s to the early 1970s, bespeak the creative dynamic that inspired this distinctly influential circle of American abstract painters.
Sam Gilliam
1968
acrylic and metallic paint on back bevel canvas,
108 x 75 inches
“Those paintings, the Slice paintings, represented Gilliam’s first breakthrough, his first signature style. …Most critics viewed the Slice paintings on backward slanting beveled -edge stretchers as ‘major breakthroughs.’ …
Alma Thomas
Macy's Parade, 1960
watercolor on paper,
22.50h x 30w inches
Macy’s Parade (1960) was inspired by large-scale helium balloon figures designed for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade by modernist puppeteer Tony Sarg. This iconic watercolor had an especially personal meaning for Thomas ...
Hilda Shapiro Thorpe
Untitled, 1959
oil on canvas
60h x 73w inches
“Thorpe’s early paintings, large gestural abstractions, are strikingly assured. Already present is the exuberance, strong linear emphasis, and lyrical color that would continue to define her works in all media ...
Howard Mehring
Untitled (Orange Allover), c.1960
magna on canvas,
14 x 12 inches
“I work rapidly and impulsively over the whole surface in waves of color ...
Thomas Downing
Untitled, c1959
magna on canvas
78 x 73 inches
“To get back to some more specific qualities I seek in my work I would say that along with the simplicity and ease there is also ...
Thomas Downing
Origo Sigma, c1958-1959
magna on canvas
70 x 63 inches
“Color very quickly makes associations with all sorts of states of mind or states of being which we can see everywhere all the time...
Howard Mehring
#5, 1962
acrylic and graphite on canvas
96 x 60 inches
“The geometric image (is as basic to color painting as) the rhythmic repetition of an element, color, space and openness, symmetry ...
Sam Gilliam
#6, 1971
acrylic on paper
20.25h x 25.75w inches
“I also spent time in Japan, and the most exciting thing there was the ritual ...
Thomas Downing
Untitled, c1955-57
magna and enamel on canvas
76h x 78w inches
“Some more remarkable people are themselves like walks in a rampant summer garden. They too change color. The only thing consistent about them is the luminosity of their colors ...
Gene Davis
Untitled, 1954
oil on masonite
30 x 42 inches
“I had the instincts very early to know where to jump in, and I always felt that you should jump in at the most advanced point of art history ...
Gene Davis
Black Turmoil, 1957
acrylic on canvas
12 x 10 inches
“The only requirement I make of art, and this may sound a little simplistic, is that it look good...
