Jan Müller (December 27, 1922 – January 29, 1958) was a New York-based figurative
expressionist
Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...
artist of the 1950s. According to art critic Carter Ratcliff, "His paintings usually erect a visual architecture sturdy enough to support an array of standing, riding, levitating figures. Gravity is absent, banished by an indifference to ordinary experience." According to the poet John Ashbery, Müller "brings a medieval sensibility to neo-
Expressionist
Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...
paintings."
Biography
Jan Müller was born on December 27, 1922, in
Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
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, postal ...
, Germany. In 1933 his family fled the
Nazis
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in N ...
to
Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and List of cities in the Czech Republic, largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 milli ...
, and later to Bex-les-Bains, Switzerland;Vivian Endicott Barnett; Thomas M. Messer; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum ‘’ Handbook, the Guggenheim Museum collection, 1900-1980; Jan Müller, 1922-1958’’ (New York : The Museum, 1980.) , pp.464-465, there he experienced the first of several attacks of rheumatic fever. He visited Paris in 1938 and two years later was apprehended and interned in a camp near
Lyon
Lyon,, ; Occitan language, Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, third-largest city and Urban area (France), second-largest metropolitan area of F ...
. Shortly after the fall of Paris, Müller was released, at which time he moved to Ornaisons, near
Narbonne
Narbonne (, also , ; oc, Narbona ; la, Narbo ; Late Latin:) is a commune in Southern France in the Occitanie region. It lies from Paris in the Aude department, of which it is a sub-prefecture. It is located about from the shores of the ...
. Following an unsuccessful attempt to escape to the United States from
Marseille
Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Fra ...
, he was able to cross the border into Spain in 1941 and proceed via Portugal to New York.
Jan Müller began to study art in 1945.
* The Art Students League of New York, New York City, for six months
* Hans Hofmann School of Fine Arts for five years
He became a US citizen in 1957.
Jan Müller died on January 29, 1958, at the age of thirty-five, in New York.
Selected solo exhibitions
* 1953, 1954, 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958: Cooperative Hansa Gallery, New York City, which he founded with
Allan Kaprow
Allan Kaprow (August 23, 1927 – April 5, 2006) was an American painter, assemblagist and a pioneer in establishing the concepts of performance art. He helped to develop the " Environment" and " Happening" in the late 1950s and 1960s, as well ...
and
Richard Stankiewicz
Richard Stankiewicz (1922–1983) was an American sculptor, known for his work in scrap metal.
Stankiewicz was born in Philadelphia, but spent his formative years in Detroit. He began painting and sculpting while in the United States Navy, in ...
* 1955, 1956: The Sun Gallery,
Provincetown
Provincetown is a New England town located at the extreme tip of Cape Cod in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, in the United States. A small coastal resort town with a year-round population of 3,664 as of the 2020 United States Census, Province ...
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...
* 1961: Zabriskie Gallery, NYC
* 1962: ''Jan Müller: 1922–1958'' organized by the
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, often referred to as The Guggenheim, is an art museum at 1071 Fifth Avenue on the corner of East 89th Street on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. It is the permanent home of a continuously exp ...
The Art Institute of Chicago
The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park (Chicago), Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and list of largest art museums, largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visit ...
* 1955: University of Minnesota
* 1955, 1956: ''Stable Show, Annual Exhibition of Painting and Sculpture'', Stable Gallery, NYC
* 1957: ''The New York School, Second Generation,'' Jewish Museum, NYC; ''Young America,''
Whitney Museum of American Art
The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–194 ...
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...
,
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
; ''Festival of Two Worlds'',
Spoleto
Spoleto (, also , , ; la, Spoletum) is an ancient city in the Italian province of Perugia in east-central Umbria on a foothill of the Apennines. It is S. of Trevi, N. of Terni, SE of Perugia; SE of Florence; and N of Rome.
History
Spolet ...
,
Perugia
Perugia (, , ; lat, Perusia) is the capital city of Umbria in central Italy, crossed by the River Tiber, and of the province of Perugia.
The city is located about north of Rome and southeast of Florence. It covers a high hilltop and pa ...
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
, MA
* 1959: ''New Images of Man,''
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
, NYC
* 1960: American Federation of Arts, circ., NYC
* 2009: ''Days Lumberyard Studios, Provincetown, MA, 1915-1972'', ACME Fine Art Boston, MA;
Charlotte
Charlotte ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. Located in the Piedmont region, it is the county seat of Mecklenburg County. The population was 874,579 at the 2020 census, making Charlotte the 16th-most populo ...
,
North Carolina
North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and ...
* Museum of Modern Art, NYC
*
Newark Museum
The Newark Museum of Art (formerly known as the Newark Museum), in Newark, Essex County, New Jersey, United States, is the state's largest museum. It holds major collections of American art, decorative arts, contemporary art, and arts of Asia, A ...
,
Newark, New Jersey
Newark ( , ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey and the seat of Essex County and the second largest city within the New York metropolitan area.New York School
*
Action painting
Action painting, sometimes called "gestural abstraction", is a style of painting in which paint is spontaneously dribbled, splashed or smeared onto the canvas, rather than being carefully applied. The resulting work often emphasizes the physical a ...
Irving Sandler
Irving Sandler (July 22, 1925 – June 2, 2018) was an American art critic, art historian, and educator. He provided numerous first hand accounts of American art, beginning with abstract expressionism in the 1950s. He also managed the Tanager Ga ...