The Yale School of Art presents Katz x Katz, an exhibition on view Jan. 15-March 10 at the School of Art’s 32 Edgewood Gallery.
The exhibition features 70 pieces from the artist’s personal collection, including examples of Katz’s signature mural-like canvases, oil sketches, working drawings, collages, prints, and cut-outs.
Among the 70 items on view are early works from the 1950s, including a self-portrait and a view of Katz’s native St. Albans, Queens. Also on view are paintings and drawings made while he was studying at the Skowhegan School of Paintings and Sculpture, SoHo cityscapes, silhouette-like polychrome sculptures, and portraits of other artists and poet friends.
The son of Russian émigré parents, Alex Katz was born in Brooklyn in 1927. He received a B.A. (1949) from Manhattan’s Cooper Union Art School. However, it was his summers (1949-50) at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine, whose teachers emphasized plein air painting and working from life, that were a transformative experience for the young artist, giving him, as he has stated, “a reason to devote my life to painting.” During the 1950s Katz allied himself with the group of avant-garde artists and writers who lived and worked in lower Manhattan, forging a distinctive style that was representational and wholly contemporary that has continued to evolve until today. In 1958 he married Ada del Moro, who would become the subject of numerous paintings. To date, he has been the subject of more than 200 solo exhibitions and has been represented in nearly 500 group shows internationally. He divides his time between studios in New York City and Lincolnville, Maine.
More information: http://art.yale.edu/Gallery
