Warner Friedman
Artist Works
58 x 76 inches Acryic on canvas
Artist Bio
Clark Gallery is honored to announce Warner Friedman's recent solo exhibiition in Connecticut received a highly positive and enthusiastic review in the Summer issue of ARTnews by Celia McGee.
Warner Friedman
The painting The White Pine made for a dramatic introduction to Warner Friedman's trompe l'oeil landscapes. Rising to its full ten-foot height directly opposite the vaulting gallery entrance, the painting appeared to be titling sharply away from the viewer until a closer approach revealed the optical illusion created by a raked view on a shaped canvas.
Friedman, who trained as an engineer before enrolling in art at the Cooper Union, in 1957, frames each pristine, crisp New England landscape with elements of a built environment that reinforce a sense of place. In The White Pine, a minimalist Yankee porch - its columns alluding to the Federal era as well as to classical antiquity, which Friedman often quotes - engages witht he flattened view of a scraggly but upright evergreen and its surrounding terrain in a way that suggests unity and disharmony at once. This house, after all, could well have been built with pinewood felled from the former forestland.
Similar thoughts come to mind when taking in the artist's other framing devices: house corners, barnyard gates, seawall fretwork, cemetery fences, and rooftops. a storm-emptied beach is seen through an amputated section of a lifeguard station. These structural elements convey protection but also exclusion, shelter and segretation, cozy nearness and unsettling distance. These pictures embrace nature while controlling it; here are the refined geometries of a certain vision ultimately wanting to keep uncertainty at bay.
The monumental, monochrome stretches of Friedman's fragmented architecture are as finely painted as his realist scenery. They show abstraction seeking a place amid representation. Litle wonder that Friedman includes the names Lewitt and Mondrian on tombstones in the half-imaginary New England graveyard of Civilization.
-Celia McGee
Selected Solo Shows
- 2008 New Arts Gallery (Litchfield, CT) – Exhibition of Recent Work
- 2007 Ferrin Gallery (Pittsfield, MA) -- Exhibition “Black White and Blue” Paintings From the Eighties
- 2007 Berkshire Museum (Pittsfield, MA) -- Exhibition of Monumental Paintings 1982-1985.
- 2007 Scott Richards Contemporary Art (San Francisco, CA) --Exhibition of Recent Work
- 2004 Hadaad-Lascano Gallery, (Gt. Barrington, MA) -- Exhibition of Recent Work
- 2003 Elaine Baker Gallery, (Boca Raton, FL)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 2003 Boca Raton Museum of Art --Retrospective Exhibition: “Surroundings”
- 2002 Elaine Baker Gallery, (Boca Raton, FL)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 2001 Ute Stebich Gallery, (Lenox, MA)—Recent Paintings
- 1999 Elaine Baker Gallery, (Boca Raton, FL)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 1999 Ute Stebich Gallery, (Lenox, MA)--Exhibition of Recent Work 1998 Freites-Revilla Gallery, (Boca Raton, FL)--Recent Paintings 1996 Horwitch Newman Gallery, (Scottsdale, AZ)--Recent Paintings 1996 Carone Gallery, (Ft. Lauderdale, FL)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 1994 Spazzi Fine Art, (Housatonic, MA)--Cut-Out Paintings of the Seventies
- 1994 Carone Gallery, (Ft. Lauderdale, FL)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 1993 Museum of Art, (Ft. Lauderdale, FL)--“Warner Friedman Paintings: Ideal Visions”
- 1993 Five Points Gallery, (Chatham, N.Y.)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 1992 Spazzi Fine Art, (Housatonic, MA)--Exhibition of Recent Work 1991 Schillay & Rehs Gallery, (N.Y.C.)--Exhibition of Recent Work 1991 Simons Rock College of Bard, (Gt. Barrington, MA)--Exhibition of Recent Work 1989 St. Peter’s Church, (N.Y.C.)--Paintings
- 1988 Central Connecticut State University, (New Britain, CT)-- Exhibition of Recent Work
- 1987 Bayless Gallery, (Norfolk, CT)--Exhibition of Recent Work--“Monuments”
- 1984 Freedman Gallery at Albright College--Painting Installation: “The South Shore”
- 1982 Jersey City College--Exhibition of Recent Work 1976 Winterhill Gallery, (Houston, TX)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 1974 Simons Rock Early College, (Gt. Barrington, MA)--Exhibition of Recent Work
- 1972 University of Connecticut--Exhibition of Recent Work 1969 Wadsworth Atheneum, (Hartford, CT)--Exhibition of Eight “Labyrinth” Paintings
- 1965 Fischbach Gallery, (N.Y.C.)--Exhibition of Small Recent Paintings, Curated by Stephen Pepper
- 1965 A.M. Sachs Gallery, (N.Y.C.)--Exhibition of Recent Work
Selected Group Shows
- 2007 Ferrin Gallery, (Lenox, MA)--“We Are There”
- 2006 Scott Richards Contemporary Art (San Francisco, CA)
- 2005 Berkshire Museum (Pittsfield, MA)--“The Power of Place”
- 2005 Ferrin Gallery, (Lenox, MA)--“House of Wonder”
- 2005 Elaine Baker Gallery, (Boca Raton, FL)—“The New Realism”, Curated by Louis K. Meise 2004 New Arts Gallery (Litchfield, CT)--“Drawing Today”
- 2004 Armory Art Center, (Palm Beach, FL)--“Bakers Dozen”
- 2004 Ferrin Gallery, (Lenox, MA)—“Winter Light”
- 2003 New Arts Gallery (Litchfield, CT)--“Clear Vision”
- 2001 Hoorn-Ashby Gallery, (N.Y.C) --“The Discerning Eye”
- 2001 Louis K. Meisel Gallery, (N.Y.C) --“Near and Far, Perspective & Structure”
- 1999 Geoff Young Gallery, (Gt. Barrington, MA)
- 1999 The Albany Center Galleries, (Albany, N.Y.)--“Berkshire Artists”
- 1998 Cristinerose Gallery, (N.Y.C)
- 1998 Elaine Baker Gallery, (Boca Raton, FL)
- 1997 Krasdale Foods Inc.
- 1997 Westunberg Gallery, (Gt. Barrington, MA)--“The Alphabet of Trees”
- 1996 Robert Kidd Gallery, (Birmingham, MI)
- 1995 The Springfield Museum of Fine Art, (Springfield, MA)--“ The New Landscape”
- 1994 Bachelier-Cardonsky Gallery, (Kent, CT)--“Viewpoints”
- 1993 Carone Gallery, (Ft. Lauderdale, FL)
- 1992 Robert Kidd Gallery, (Birmingham, MI)
- 1992 Spazzi Fine Art, (Housatonic, MA)--”Cacophony”
- 1992 Five Points Gallery, (Chatham, N.Y.)--”Spirituality and Symbols of Eroticism”
- 1991 Schillay & Rehs Gallery, (N.Y.C.)
- 1990 Ted Gallery, (Albany, N.Y.)--”Aspects of Realism”
- 1989 Berkshire Artisans Gallery, (Pittsfield, MA)
- 1987 Leonarda Di Mauro Gallery, (N.Y.C.)
- 1985 Civilization, (N.Y.C.)--Benefit Exhibition of Small Works
- 1981 Berkshire Museum, (Pittsfield, MA)--First Annual Invitational Exhibit, Curated by Debra Balken
- 1978 Susan Caldwell Gallery, (N.Y.C.)--”Towards the Monochromatic”, Curated by Michael Walls
- 1975 Contemporary Gallery, (Dallas, TX)
- 1973 University of Connecticut--Faculty Show
- 1972 Wadsworth Atheneum--Connecticut Academy
- 1970 Wadsworth Atheneum--”Black, White & Grey”, Curated by Sam Wagstaff 1966 Corcoran Gallery, (Washington, D.C.)
- 1966 Park Place Gallery, (N.Y.C.)
- 1964 Pennsylvania Academy 1963 Brata Gallery, (N.Y.C.)--”Friends of the Tenth Street Co-ops” l
Selected Articles & Reviews
- Keith V. Shaw, “Small Gems”, The Berkshire Eagle, 2008
- Amy Norkus, “Black, White and Blue”, The Berkshire Eagle, 2007 Geoffrey Young, “Recent Readings of the Housatonic”, from “Art and the River” 2005
- Jennifer Ball, “Drawing Today”, Art News, January 2005
- Heather Schreckengast, “Warner Friedman: Voyeur Of Nature”, Florida Design, Spring 2004
- Dale M. King, “Surroundings”, The Sun-Sentinel, October 13, 2003. Gary Schwan, “Warner Friedman”, Palm Beach Post, October 12, 2003.
- Ken Willis, “Surroundings”, Citylink, September 17, 2003.
- Gary Rausch, “Landscape Frame-up”, Scottsdale Tribune, July 11,1996.
- Gloria Russell, “The New Landscape” Springfield Museum of Fine Arts, Sunday Republican, September 10, 1995.
- Daniel M. Klein, “Berkshire Landscapes”, Berkshire Magazine, Spring 1995.
- Jude Schwendenwien, “Viewpoints” at Bachelier-Chardonsky, Art New England, October-November, 1994.
- Charles Hagen, “In Connecticut”, New York Times, July 8, 1994. Roger Hurlburt, “The Mathematics of Art”, The Sun-Sentinel, February 20, 1994.
- Helen L. Kohen, “Warner Friedman Paintings: Ideal Visions”, Miami Herald, Sept. 26, 1993.
- Eunice Agar, “Warner Friedman”, American Artist, January 1989. Tullio DeSantis, “Friedman at the Freedman”, The Reading Eagle, May 20, 1984.
- Charles Boneti, “1981 Berkshire Museum Invitational”, Art New England, August 1981.
Grants
- 2006 Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant
- 1996 Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant
- 1993 Richard Florsheim Art Fund Grant
- 1990 Massachusetts Artist Fellowship
Collections
- Alamo Rent A Car, Inc.
- Mentor Partners
- Albright College Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale
- The Andover Company News
- American Publishing, Inc.
- Becton Dickinson
- Owens Corning Collection
- Federal Reserve Bank of Boston
- Tambrand, Inc.
- Fidelity Investments
- Texaco, Inc.
- First National Bank of Chicago
- The Wadsworth Atheneum
- The McCrory Corporation
- Boca Raton Museum Of Art