Got Diebenkorn?

"I'm really a traditional painter, not avant garde at all. I wanted to follow a tradition and extend it."

Richard Diebenkorn

These are the words of artist Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993), who came to define the California school of Abstract Expressionism in the 1950s. This month, Gallery member artist Jackie Afram suggested that member artists challenge themselves to paint in Diebenkorn's style. Many artists rose to the challenge, resulting in a "Diebenkorn Corner" with gallery artists displaying their versions of Diebenkorn-inspired paintings.

"Seawall" by Richard Diebenkorn (1957)

Although he moved back and forth between making abstract and figural paintings throughout his career, Diebenkorn's version of Abstract Expressionism became an important counterpoint to the more well-known brand of the movement popularized by artists such as Jackson Pollack and Willem De Kooning. During the 1950s through the 1960s, he was noted for developing a unique form of Northern California Realism, now referred to as the Bay Area Figurative School. His later work (best known as the Ocean Park paintings) were instrumental to his achievement of worldwide acclaim. In turn, Diebenkorn's Ocean Park paintings were said to be highly influenced by Henry Matisse's paintings French Window at Collioure and View of Notre Dame. 

Visitors to the gallery this month have been fascinated with what our artists submitted in the Diebenkorn style, and the artists loved the chance to stretch their artistic muscles and try something new.

"Los Lobos Pines," Jackie Afram 

"Vertical Spectrum," Parvaneh Limbert

"Beach Bound," Bryan Jernigan


--Sandi Parker, Gallery Co-Director