RON GORCHOV
Being deeply engaged in the exploration of liberating ideas of form, Ron Gorchov has been working with shaped canvases since the late 1960's. His custom-fabricated, saddle-like stretchers avoid the clear edges of an ordinary canvas – contrary to the rigid format of the rectangle that dominated the medium of painting at that time – and offer a novel investigation of space, scale and surface.
Opening the picture plane to the space in front of it and exposing their stretchers otherwise closely attached to the wall, the artist's works allow an unusual experience of depth. Diverging from the impression of a flat screen, they fuse ideas of painting and sculpture.
"Gorchov has his own peculiar and particular way of painting and it is precisely the efficacy of that fact that has allowed him to add something to painting that we can recognize as being at home in our time. Inevitably. He has situated himself within the history of the medium, re-reading, as might be expected, the saturated hues of Rothko or the stripes and zips of Newman, to ensure the continuity, centricity, and innovative power of abstract language. He has pushed the medium into a personal statement that we feel and recognize: liquid paint; radiant colour; the superposition of different layers; simple, gentle, somewhat perturbing shapes; lightness of touch; curved spaces; matte pastels; thick brushtrokes; monochromes; nuances; thin fabric; variation in size; subtlety."
Kevin Power, Shaping a changing time in Ron Gorchov. Where The Soul Hides, Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno, 2011
Image: Merope, 2017, oil on linen, 217 x 191,5 x 34.5 cm. Photo courtesy Cheim & Read, New York
Solo Exhibitions
Selected Institutional Exhibitions
Biography
VITA
1930
Born in Chicago
1947 - 1948
University of Mississippi, Oxford
1948 - 1950
Roosevelt College & Art Institute, Chicago
1950 - 1951
University of Illinois, Urbana
1959
Ingram Merrill Award
1975
National Endowment for the Arts Award for Painting
CAPS Award
1994
John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship Award for Painting
2010
Skowhegan Medal for Painting
Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant
2020
Died in New York
SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
Denver Art Museum, Denver
Detroit Institute of Art, Detroit
Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Museum of Modern Art, New York
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2019
At the Cusp of the 80s, Paintings 1979 – 1983
Cheim & Read, New York
Theogony according to Ron Gorchov
Thomas Brambilla
Modern Art, London
2018
Theogony According to Ron Gorchov
Thomas Brambilla, Bergamo
Galerie Max Hetzler, Berlin
2017
Maruani Mercier, Knokke
Cheim & Read, New York
2016
Works from the 1970s
Vito Schnabel Projects, New York
Concord
Vito Schnabel Gallery, St. Moritz
2015
Recent Works
Thomas Brambilla, Bergamo
Ron Gorchov (curated by Vito Schnabel)
Sotheby’s S|2, London
2014
Serapis
Contemporary Art Museum, St.Louis
2013
39 Great Jones, New York
Galerie Forsblom, Helsinki
Monsieur X
Vito Schnabel Projects, New York
Recent Watercolors
Lesley Heller Workspace, New York
2012
Recent Paintings
Galerie Richard, Paris
Ron Gorchov (curated by Phong Bui)
Cheim & Read, New York
2011
Ron Gorchov: Donde Se Occulta el Alma
Centro Atlantico de Arte Modern (CAAM), Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
2010
Recent Watercolors
George Lawson Gallery, San Francisco
2009
Ron Gorchov and Alain Kirili
Galerie Richard, Paris
2008
Recent Paintings
Nicholas Robinson Gallery, New York
2006
Ron Gorchov - Double Trouble
MoMA PS1, Long Island City
2005
Vito Schnabel, New York
1994
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Ferndale
1993
Locks Gallery, Philadelphia
1992
Jack Tilton Gallery, New York
1990
Jack Tilton Gallery, New York
1985
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Ferndale
1984
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Ferndale
1983
Marlborough Gallery, New York
1981
Montana State University Fine Art Gallery, Bozeman
1980
Galerie AK, Frankfurt
Hamilton Gallery, New York
Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York
1979
Entrance, 1971 - 1979, Second Installation
MoMA PS1, Long Island City
Hamilton Gallery, New York
Young Hoffman Gallery, Chicago
1978
Matrix Program
University Art Museum, New York
Galerie M, Bochum
1977
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Ferndale
1976
Texas Gallery, Houston
Rooms
MoMA PS1, Long Island City
1975
Fischbach Gallery, New York
1972
Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse
1966
Recent Paintings
Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York
1963
Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York
1960
Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2019
Artist's choice: Amy Sillman – The Shape of Shape
The Museum of Modern Art, New York
Gazing into the void
Bjorn & Gundorph Gallery, Aarhus
The social environment
Chiesa di Santa Maria delle Penitenti, Venice
Flat Out: Drawing, 2000 – 2019
Mana Contemporary, New Jersey
2017
To bid or not to bid
Thomas Brambilla, Bergamo
The Horizontal
Cheim & Read, New York
The Colllectors Home
Avlskarl Gallery, Copenhagen
2016
Shapeshifters
Luhring Augustine Gallery, New York
Painting into Three Dimensions
Galerie Richard, New York
A quoi tient la beauté des étreintes
FRAC, Auvergne, Clermont Ferrand
2015
Thirty Nine Years
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Ferndale
Works on Paper 2015
Philip Slein Gallery, Saint Louis
Intimacy in Discours: Reasonable and Unreasonable Sized Paintings
Mana Contemporary, New Jersey City
Der Beste Anfang
Thomas Brambilla, Bergamo
2014
Cruce de colecciones
Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno (CAAM), Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
Funzione Continua
Thomas Brambilla, Bergamo
Green Circle, Black Diamond
Ratio 3, San Francisco
The Shaped Canvas, Revisited
Luxembourg & Dayan, New York
2013
Cuaderno De Bitácora 1. Obra Sobre Papel En La colleción Caam
Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno (CAAM), Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
On Painting
Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno (CAAM), Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
39greatjones
Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich
Gallery Selections
Russell Browman Art Advisory, Chicago
Hors Frontières – Abstractions
Galerie Richard, Paris
DSM-V
The Future Moynihan Station, Vito Schnabel, New York
2012
Painting Towards Three Dimensions
Galerie Richard, New York
Aufbruch. Malerei und realer Raum
Museum im Kulturspeicher, Würzburg;
Akademie der Künste, Berlin;
Museum Pfalzgalerie Kaiserslautern, Kaiserslautern
Image/abstraction/object
Russell Browman Art Advisory, Chicago
Little Languages/Coded Pictures (curated by Theresa Hackett & Michelle Weinberg)
Lesley Heller Workspace, New York
Brucennial 2012 – Harder. Betterer. Fasterer. Strongerer
Brucennial, New York
Post War American Art
David Klein Gallery, Birmingham
2011
Paper 2011
Janet Kurnatowski Gallery, New York
It's All Good!! Apocalypse Now
Sideshow Gallery, Brooklyn
Brooklyn Rail 10 Year Anniversary Silent Benefit Auction
Visual Arts Gallery, School of Visual Arts, New York
2010
THE BIENNIAL WINTER SALON 2010
Elga Wimmer PCC, New York
Fool's House
Columbia University, New York
Between Picture and Viewer: The Image in Contemporary Painting
Visual Arts Gallery, School of Visual Arts, New York
Territories, Left of Center (curated by Jeffrey Uslip)
The Luckman Gallery, California State University, Los Angeles
Wall to Wall
Daniel Weinberg Gallery, Los Angeles
who loves the sun
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Ferndale
16 Artistes – Oeuvre sur papier
Galerie Richard, Paris
It's a Wonderful Tenth
Sideshow Gallery, New York
Winter Salon
Björn Ressle Gallery, New York
2009
More Mergers & Acquisitions
Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta
Party at Chris's House (curated by Phong Bui)
Janet Kurnatowski Gallery, New York
Ron GORCHOV, Alan KIRILI – La célébration de la main
Galerie Richard, Paris
Triple Play (curated by Lilly Wei)
Lesley Heller Gallery, New York
NY Masters
Galerie Richard, Paris
2008
Invitational Exhibition of Visual Art
The American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York
Party at Phong's (curated by Chris Martin)
Janet Kurnatowski Gallery, New York
High Times, Hard Times. New York Painting 1967 -1975
ZKM – Zentrum für Kunst und medientechnologie Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe
2007
High Times, Hard Times. New York Painting 1967 – 1975
Neue Galerie Graz,, Universalmuseum Graz, Graz
Tiempos intensos, tiempos dificiles – Pintura de Nueva York 1967 – 1975
Museo Tamayo, Mexico City
2006
Ron Gorchov, Judy Pfaff, John Torreano
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Ferndale
2000
The First Fifty Years
Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York
1997
Roland Pease Collection
Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York
Salient Green
Susanne Hilberry Gallery, Birmingham
1996
PAPIER, Bestandsaufnahme XIII
Galerie M, Bochum
Epitaphs, Invitational Exhibition
Edward Thorp Gallery, New York
1995
Bestandsaufnahme XII
Galerie M, Bochum
47th Annual Purchase Exhibition
Edward Thorp Gallery, New York
1993
30th Anniversary Exhibition (Benefit Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts)
Leo Castelli Gallery, New York
Paintings from the Permanent Collection
Museum of Modern Art, New York
The Return of the Cadavre Exquis
The Drawing Center, New York
Paintings from the Permanent Collection
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
1992
Invitational (curated by Marjory Wellish)
John Good Gallery, New York
1991
Bestandsaufnahme VIII
Galerie M, Bochum
Abstract Painting of the 90's
Andre Emerich Gallery, New York
1990
Clifford Still: A Dialogue
Phillip Briet Gallery, New York
1989
Small and Stellar
Ruth Siegel Gallery, New York
Urrealism (curated by Alan Jones)
Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York
1986
Inspiration by Nature
Jack Tilton Gallery, New York
1985
American Abstract Painting 1960 – 1980
Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles
Gallery Artists
Malborough Gallery, New York
1984
Eccentric Images
Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles
1983
Language, Drama, Source 6 Vision
New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York
1979
The 1970s: New American Painting
New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York
1977
Early Work By Five Contemporary Artists
New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York
Whitney Biennial 1977
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
1976
Rooms
MoMA PS1, New York
Approaching Painting, Part Three
Hallwalls at The Church, Buffalo
1975
Whitney Biennial 1975
Whitney Museum of Contemporary Art, New York
Collection
CAC – Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati
1961
Young America 1960
CAC – Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Vito Schnabel Projects (Ed.): Ron Gorchov: Works from the 1970s, New York 2017
Sotheby’s S|2 London (Ed.): Ron Gorchov, London 2015
Cheim & Read (Ed.): Ron Gorchov, New York 2012
Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno (Ed.): Ron Gorchov: Donde Se Oculta el Alma (Where The Soul Hides), Las Palmas de Gran Canaria 2011
Nicholas Robinson Gallery (Ed.): Ron Gorchov: Recent Paintings, New York 2008
Vito Schnabel (Ed.): Ron Gorchov, New York 2005
Jack Tilton Gallery (Ed.): It’s Not What You’re Doing..., New York 1990
Publications
Selected Press
Samizdat April 2018