Irving Kriesberg

Irving Kriesberg (March 13, 1919 – November 11, 2009) was an American painter, sculptor, educator, author, and filmmaker, whose work combined elements of Abstract Expressionism with representational human, animal, and humanoid forms. Because Kriesberg blended formalist elements with figurative forms he is often considered to be a Figurative Expressionist.[1]

Irving Kriesberg
Kriesberg in his studio c. 1997
Born(1919-03-13)March 13, 1919
Chicago
DiedNovember 11, 2009(2009-11-11) (aged 90)
New York City
NationalityAmerican
Known forAmerican Figurative Expressionism

Biography

Irving Kriesberg was born March 13, 1919, in Chicago, Illinois. His parents were Bessie and Max Kriesberg. Kriesberg had three brothers, Lee (born in 1915), Martin (born in 1917), and Louis (born in 1926).[2]

As a child, Kriesberg filled sketchbooks with images of animals inspired by visits to Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History with his brother Martin.[3] He graduated from Von Steuben High School in 1937 and studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where he received his BFA in 1941. His teachers at the School of the Art Institute included the Russian-American avant-garde painter, Boris Anisfeld.[4]

Shortly after graduation from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Kriesberg traveled to Mexico City, where he lived and worked from 1941 until 1944. He studied graphic arts at the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plasticas, Mexico City and exhibited with Taller de Gráfica Popular.[5] In 1945, Kriesberg moved to New York City and got a job animating signs in Times Square with Artkraft Strauss.

Kriesberg befriended the Cubist sculptor, Jacques Lipchitz, who introduced Kriesberg's work to Curt Valentin. Valentin, a German-Jewish art dealer, ran an eponymous art gallery on 32 east 57th Street in Manhattan, which was known for exhibiting the work of established modern artists including Pablo Picasso, Alexander Calder, Max Beckmann, and Henry Moore.[6] Valentin exhibited Kriesberg's work as part of a group exhibition in 1953 alongside fellow artists, Reg Butler, Bruno Cassina, Jan Cox, and Alton Pickens. Kriesberg had his first solo exhibition at the Curt Valentin Gallery in 1955. Lipchitz wrote the introductory text for the exhibition catalogue.[7]

Kriesberg had his first major museum show in 1952, when several of his paintings were selected by Dorothy Miller, curator of the Museum of Modern Art, for the landmark group exhibition, 15 Americans.[8]15 Americans also included Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, Mark Rothko, Williams Baziotes, and other seminal American modern artists.[9] In 1961, Kriesberg had a solo exhibition at the Jewish Museum. The exhibition was a 15 year career retrospective for Kriesberg, featuring works from 1945 through 1960. It also marked the debut screening of Kriesberg's 1954 animated film, Pastoral.[10] The show at the Jewish Museum ran concurrent with a solo exhibition at Graham Gallery. Allan Kaprow wrote the essay for the Graham Gallery show catalogue, stating that "Irving Kriesberg has pushed the boundaries of his art farther than most artists. He has increased the possibilities for us all."[11]

In 1965, Kriesberg received a Fulbright Fellowship to travel to India. He traveled the countryside and made a significant body of paintings on canvas and paper in Simla. In 1966, Kriesberg presented this work in a 1966 solo exhibition at the Kumar Gallery in New Delhi.[12]

Kriesberg taught at several academic institutions including: Parsons School of Design, New York City (1955 - 1961), Pratt Institute, NY (1961 - 1972), Yale University (1962 - 1969), City University of New York (1969 - 1972), State University, NY (1972 - 1976), and Columbia University (1977 - 1978).

Artwork

In addition to painting, printmaking and, sculpture, Kriesberg was involved with cinematography. He created two avant-garde animations Pastoral (1954, 20 minutes, 16mm film with musical score by Douglas Townsend) and Out of Into (1972, 17 min, 16 mm film with an electric score by Bülent Arel). He received his M.A. in film from New York University in 1972.[13][14]

Out of Into premiered at the Solomon R. Guggenheim museum during the exhibition 10 Independents. The exhibition was the museum's first artist initiated and organized exhibition. Kriesberg was an exhibiting artist, as well as the curator of the exhibition which also featured, Romare Bearden, Robert Beauchamp, Mary Frank, Red Grooms, Lester Johnson, Joseph Kurhajec, Maryan (Maryan S. Maryan), Peter Schumann, and H.C. Westermann.[15]

Kriesberg also created several works of public art, including a banner for the 1989 Passover Peace Coalition rally[16] and a 40-foot banner called Peace Dove, which was an integral visual element of the June 12th Rally for nuclear disarmament in 1982.

Selected solo exhibitions
Kriesberg canvas featured in Tashilha

Selected group exhibitions

Awards

Kriesberg received a Ford Foundation grant in 1965, the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Memorial Award in 1976,[20] a Fulbright Fellowship from 1965-1966, a National Endowment for the Arts Award in 1981, and a Lee Krasner Award from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation for a lifetime of achievement in 2002. [21]

In 1992, he was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate member, and became a full Academician in 1994.[22]

Museum collections

Kriesberg's paintings are held in the permanent collection of over 74 American art museums including, the Museum of Modern Art,[23] the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Corcoran Gallery, the Brooklyn Museum,[24] the Detroit Institute of Art,[25] the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum, the National Gallery, the Butler Institute of American Art, the Birmingham Museum of Art,[26] The Jewish Museum,[27] the University of Michigan Museum of Art, the Dayton Art Institute, the Allentown Art Museum, the Boca Raton Museum of Art, the Rose Art Museum, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, the Scottsdale MoCA, and the Crocker Art Museum.

Books written by Irving Kriesberg
  • Looking at pictures, a guide to intelligent appreciation (Chicago: Center for the Study of Liberal Education for Adults, 1955)
  • Art: The Visual Experience (New York: Pitman Publishing Corporation, 1964)
  • Working with color: a manual for painters (New York: Prentice Hall, 1986) ISBN 0-442-01303-5

References
  1. Fox, Margalit (November 18, 2009). "Irving Kriesberg, Artist of Dreamlike Landscapes, Dies at 90". The New York Times.
  2. Kriesberg, Louis (2016). Louis Kriesberg: Pioneer in Peace and Constructive Conflict Resolution Studies. Springer. pp. 4–5. ISBN 978-3-319-40751-7.
  3. Zucker, Adam. "A Painter's Life." In Irving Kriesberg: Animal Narratives. Longview, Texas: Estate of Irving Kriesberg, 2012, pp. 2–5.
  4. Campbell, Lawrence (March 1986). "Irving Kriesberg at Graham Modern". Art in America.
  5. Herskovic, Marika. American Abstract and Figurative Expressionism: Style Is Timely Art Is Timeless (New York School Press, 2009.) ISBN 978-0-9677994-2-1. p.151
  6. Christel, Hollevoet-Force (2018). "Valentin, Curt". www.metmuseum.org. Retrieved 2021-02-19.
  7. Irving Kriesberg (Exhibition catalogue). New York: Curt Valentin Gallery. 1955.
  8. 15 Americans (New York, Museum of Modern Art, 1952.) p. 36-37
  9. "15 Americans online exhibition archive". MoMA.
  10. Irving Kriesberg. 1961. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  11. Kaprow, Allan (1961). (Untitled essay). pp. 1–3. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  12. "U.S Painter Amazed at Indian Art". The Times of India. 1966.
  13. Film-Making in the Art Curriculum (Art Journal, Winter, 1968-1969, vol. 28, no. 2, p. 175-176)
  14. Animation as a Form of Expression: An Artist's Reflections on a Personal Mode of Film Making (Leonardo, Spring, 1974, vol. 7, no. 2, p. 105-110)
  15. Ashton, Dore (1972). 10 Independents (exhibition catalogue). New York: Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation.
  16. Goldman, Ari L. (1989-04-18). "Modern Concerns Enrich Passover Rituals". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2021-06-03.
  17. "End of a Dream, (oil on canvas)". Curators at Work VI. Muscarelle Museum of Art. 2016. Retrieved 20 Jun 2018.
  18. "Three rare works from the late 1950s by Irving Kriesberg on view at Anita Shapolsky Gallery". artdaily.com. Retrieved 2021-02-22.
  19. Carlos Talavera, Juan (2021-08-18). "Exhiben registros gráficos sobre la diversidad en el Museo Mural Diego Rivera". Excélsior (in Spanish). Retrieved 2021-08-22.
  20. "Irving Kriesberg". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Retrieved 2022-12-06.
  21. "Irving Kriesberg | Works | Pollock Krasner Image Collection". www.pkf-imagecollection.org. Retrieved 2022-12-06.
  22. "National Academicians". National Academy of Design. Retrieved 2021-02-22.
  23. "Irving Kriesberg | MoMA". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved 2022-12-06.
  24. "Brooklyn Museum". www.brooklynmuseum.org. Retrieved 2022-12-06.
  25. "Frog | Detroit Institute of Arts Museum". dia.org. Retrieved 2022-12-06.
  26. "A Dancer Before the Sheep | Birmingham Museum of Art". 2022-10-20. Retrieved 2022-12-06.
  27. "The Jewish Museum". The Jewish Museum. Retrieved 2022-12-06.
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