John Zurier
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John Zurier (born 1956) is an American abstract
painter Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...
, known for his minimal, near-monochrome paintings. His work has shown across the United States as well as in Europe and Japan. He has worked in Reykjavik, Iceland and Berkeley, California. Zurier lives in
Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...
.


Education

John Zurier was born in 1956 in Santa Monica, California. He received a BA degree in
Landscape Architecture Landscape architecture is the design of outdoor areas, landmarks, and structures to achieve environmental, social-behavioural, or aesthetic outcomes. It involves the systematic design and general engineering of various structures for constructio ...
from the
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...
in 1979 and a
Master of Fine Arts A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.) is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts admi ...
degree in
painting Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...
from the University of California at Berkeley in 1983.


Career and exhibition

Zurier's work has been shown in galleries and museums since 1980. Zurier was included in the 2002 Whitney Biennial in New York City, the 2008
Gwangju Biennale The Gwangju Biennale is a contemporary art biennale founded in September 1995 in Gwangju, South Jeolla province, South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half ...
in Gwangju, South Korea. and the 2012
São Paulo Art Biennial The São Paulo Art Biennial ( Portuguese: ''Bienal de São Paulo'') was founded in 1951 and has been held every two years since. It is the second oldest art biennial in the world after the Venice Biennale (in existence since 1895), which serves as ...
in São Paulo, Brazil.


Style and technique

Zurier paints abstract, near-monochrome paintings whose colors range from muted tones to vibrant hues. Zurier's abstract paintings are informed by
abstract expressionism Abstract expressionism in the United States emerged as a distinct art movement in the aftermath of World War II and gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s, a shift from the American social realism of the 1930s influenced by the Great Depressi ...
, Post-War French painting, and Japanese aesthetics. His main interest is in simplicity, surface modulation, and color, as those are tied to people's experience of time. Zurier's reductive paintings show his dedication to color, the material fact of painting, and the history of painting. His soft-hued abstract paintings play at crossing the line into representation with the sensation of nature, the silence of luminous weather, and the human touch. Capturing qualities of light and weather effects, Zurier employs a range of brushstrokes and surface treatments, varying from revealing the texture of the canvas or obscuring it with layers of thick
impasto Impasto is a technique used in painting, where paint is laid on an area of the surface thickly, usually thick enough that the brush or painting-knife strokes are visible. Paint can also be mixed right on the canvas. When dry, impasto provides tex ...
. Zurier's work has been described as transcending the gestural and material to evoke the emotional. While minimal, Zurier's practice is not
minimalist In visual arts, music, and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in the post-war era in western art. The movement is often interpreted as a reaction to abstract expressionism and modernism; it anticipated contemporary post-mi ...
, but rather composed of quiet works that focus on the structure and possibilities of a brushstroke. “I think the Japanese painter
Ike No Taiga was a Japanese painter and calligrapher born in Kyoto during the Edo period. Together with Yosa Buson, he perfected the ''bunjinga'' (or '' nanga'') genre. The majority of his works reflected his passion for classical Chinese culture and painti ...
723–1776 7 (seven) is the natural number following 6 and preceding 8. It is the only prime number preceding a cube. As an early prime number in the series of positive integers, the number seven has symbolic associations in religion, mythology, supers ...
was right,” Zurier has said, “the most difficult thing to achieve in painting is creating a space where absolutely nothing has been painted.”


Public collections

*
Berkeley Art Museum The Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA, formerly abbreviated as BAM/PFA) are a combined art museum, repertory movie theater, and film archive associated with the University of California, Berkeley. Lawrence Rinder was Director ...
, Berkeley, California, U.S. *
Colby College Museum of Art The Colby College Museum of Art is an art museum on the campus of Colby College in Waterville, Maine. Founded in 1959 and now comprising five wings, nearly 8,000 works and more than 38,000 square feet of exhibition space, the Colby College Museu ...
, Waterville, Maine, U.S. *
Farnsworth Art Museum The Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, Maine, United States, is an art museum that specializes in American art. Its permanent collection includes works by such artists as Gilbert Stuart, Thomas Sully, Thomas Eakins, Winslow Homer, George Bellows, ...
, Rockland, Maine, U.S. *Microsoft Corporation Art Collection, Redmond, Washington, U.S. *Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden *Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, U.S. *
Oakland Museum of California Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, California, Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major We ...
, Oakland, California, U.S. *
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern art, modern and contemporary art museum and nonprofit organization located in San Francisco, California. SFMOMA was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th-century art ...
, San Francisco, California, U.S. *University of California, San Francisco Art Collection, San Francisco, California, U.S. *
Principia College Principia College is a private liberal arts college in Elsah, Illinois. It was founded in 1912 by Mary Kimball Morgan with the purpose of "serving the Cause of Christian Science." Morgan wrote in her book, Education at the Principia that, "Alt ...
, Elsah, Illinois, U.S.


Exhibitions

;Selected solo exhibitions
Zurier: Sometimes (Over Me the Mountain), BERG Contemporary, Reykjavík, Iceland, 2018''Mind of Winter«, Galerie Nordenhake, Berlin, Germany, 2018''Without Distance, Peter Blum Gallery, New York, NY, 2017''the Very End of the Blue Sky, The Club, Tokyo, Japan, 2017''and Troubled Air, Anglim Gilbert Gallery, San Francisco, CA, 2017''Zurier - The Last Summer Light, Office Baroque, Brussels, Belgium, 2016''Galerie Nordenhake, Berlin, Germany, 2016''North and Night, Galerie Nordenhake, Stockholm, Sweden, 2015''of the Future, Peter Blum Gallery, New York, NY, 2015''
*John Zurier: Matrix 255", Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, CA, 2014 *John Zurier: Recent Paintings, Lawrence Markey, San Antonio, TX, 2014 *Knowledge is a blue naiveté, Galerie Nordenhake, Berlin, Germany, 2013 *A spring a thousand years ago," Peter Blum Gallery, NY, 2013 *John Zurier: Watercolors," Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, 2013 *John Zurier, Patrick de Brock Gallery, Knokke, Belgium, 2012 *John Zurier Paintings and Watercolors, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, 2011 *White Paintings and Night Paintings, Peter Blum Chelsea, NY, 2010 *Nordic Paintings, Galería Javier López, Madrid, 2010 *John Zurier - New Paintings, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, June 2009 *John Zurier, Galeria Javier López, Madrid, Spain, 2007 *John Zurier: New Works, Peter Blum SoHo, New York, NY, 2007 *John Zurier: New Paintings, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, 2005 *John Zurier: New Paintings, Larry Becker Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA, 2005 *John Zurier, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, 2003 *John Zurier: Oblaka, Peer, London, 2003 *John Zurier, Gallery Paul Anglim, San Francisco, 2001 *John Zurier Paintings 1997–1999, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco (catalogue with interview by Lawrence Rinder), 2000 *John Zurier: Monotypes, Aurobora Press, San Francisco, CA, 1999 *John Zurier: Abstract Paintings, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, 1994 *John Zurier: Monotypes, Concourse Gallery, Bank of America World Headquarters, San Francisco, CA, 1990 *John Zurier: New Paintings, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, 1989 *John Zurier, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, 1986 *John Zurier, Pamela Auchincloss Gallery, Santa Barbara, 1985 *John Zurier, Dana Reich Gallery, San Francisco, CA, 1984 *John Zurier, Sun Gallery, Hayward, CA, 1984 ;Selected group exhibitions

* ttp://www.gallerypauleanglim.com/Press_Releases/Entries/2015/11/28_A_Studio_In_Iceland.html''A Studio In Iceland, Anglim Gilbert Gallery, San Francisco, CA, November 2015 - January 2016''br>Trail: Contemporary Prints, Drawings, and Photographs from the Collection, Colby College Museum of Art, 2015''São Paulo Biennial, São Paulo, Brazil, 2012''Biennial, Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA, 2010''Tableau, Cheim and Read Gallery, New York, NY, 2010''A Hundred or So Stars Visible to the Naked Eye, Berkeley Art Museum, University of California, Berkeley, CA, 2009''''Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, Korea, 2008''from the Concrete, El Centro College, Dallas, TX, 2007''and Surface: Works on Paper, Peter Blum Gallery, New York, NY, 2006''Between Promise and Fulfillment, curated by David Austin, Kettle's Yard, Cambridge, United Kingdom, 2003''
*Minimalism: Then and Now, Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, CA, 2001 *Practice and Process: New Painterly Abstraction in California, Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena and the Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA, 1998 *Three Painters: Anne Appleby, Gregg Renfrow, John Zurier, Arts Benicia Center, Benicia, CA, 1996 *Donald Feasel, Philip Morsberger, John Zurier: Recent Paintings, Shasta College Gallery, Redding, CA, 1993 *Chain Reaction Six, San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery, San Francisco, CA, 1990 *Sixteen Young Bay Area Artists, Colorado State University Art Gallery, Fort Collins, CO, 1988 *Expressive Abstraction, Berkeley Art Center, Berkeley, CA, 1986 *MFA/UCB/1984, University of California, Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, CA, 1984


Monotype projects

*Aurobora Press, San Francisco, CA, 1998 and 2002 *Garner Tullis Workshop, Santa Barbara, CA, 1989–1990 *Garner Tullis Workshop, Emeryville, CA, 1985–1986


Awards and teaching

*John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, 2010 *PresentEminent Adjunct Professor, California College of the Arts, 2006


Books, monographs and catalogs


Zurier: Paintings 1981-2014, (artist monograph), Essay by Robert Storr and foreword by Lawrence Rinder, 2015''
*2012 São Paulo Bienal, The Imminence of Poetics, (catalog), Luis Pérez-Oramas, Tobi Maier, André Severo, Isabela Villanueva, 2012 *Repeat After Me - Poems by Bill Berkson, Watercolors by John Zurier, Published by Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, CA, 2011 *2010 California Biennial: Orange County Museum of Art, (catalog), Sarah C. Bancroft, 2010 *To: Night (Contemporary Representations of the Night), (catalog), curated by Joachim Pissarro, Mara Hoberman, Julia Moreno, 2008 *The 7th Gwangju Biennial: 2008 Annual Report, (catalog), curated by Okwui Enwezor, et al., 2008 *John Zurier Night Paintings: 2007–2008, (catalog), Larry Becker Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA, 2008 *Pope, Alexander, John Zurier: New Paintings, (catalog), Text from “The Essay on Man” San Francisco, CA: Gallery Paule Anglim, 2005 *EXODUS: Between Promise and Fulfillment, (catalog), Essay by Anthony Downey, Kettle's Yard, University of Cambridge: Cambridge, England, 2003 *Rinder, Lawrence, et al. Whitney Biennial 2002, (catalog), New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 2002 *John Zurier Paintings 1997–1999, (catalog), Interview with Lawrence Rinder, San Francisco, CA: Gallery Paule Anglim, 2000 *Practice and Process: New Painterly Abstraction in California, (catalog), Armory Center for the Arts and the Richmond Art Center, Pasadena and Richmond, CA, 1998 *Abstraction Absolved: Ten Bay Area Painters, (catalog) Introduction by Keith Lachowicz, Oakland, CA: Mills College Art Gallery, 1996 *Garner Tullis Workshop: Monotypes, (catalog) Introduction by Memory Holloway, Praz/Vully, Switzerland, Galerie Au Poisson Rouge, 1986


References


External links


John Zurier: Artists’ websiteAnglim Gilbert GalleryPeter Blum GalleryGalerie NordenhakeLawerence Markey Inc.Patrick De Brock GalleryGaleria Javier Lopez
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zurier, John American abstract painters American contemporary painters 20th-century American painters 20th-century American male artists American male painters 21st-century American painters 21st-century American male artists Painters from San Francisco Artists from the San Francisco Bay Area Living people 1956 births