First retrospective of boundary-pushing artist Jack Whitten opens in May

“Celebrates...a career dedicated to infusing abstraction with political and social content.”—ARTNews

Columbus, OH—originally posted January 22, 2015—Jack Whitten: Five Decades of Painting, the first career-spanning retrospective of the groundbreaking artist, goes on view at the Wexner Center May 16–August 2, 2015. Featuring more than 60 canvasses by the dynamic African American artist, the exhibition traces the trajectory of Whitten’s restless formal experimentation from the mid-1960s to the present, with paintings that, while abstract, often contain cultural, political, and social references.

Says Wexner Center Director Sherri Geldin, “We’re thrilled to bring this extraordinary exhibition to Ohio. It’s fair to say that for nearly 50 years, Whitten’s achievements have been known and appreciated primarily by art-world ‘insiders.’ This expansive survey of his life’s work reveals to a larger public the stunning originality, depth, and power of his practice. Whether collaged, inlaid, chiseled, laminated, or poured, Whitten’s paintings are a hybrid medium solely of his own conception, and they are riveting.”

The works in this retrospective “bristle with triumphant life” (ARTNews), and date back to Whitten’s earliest paintings in the 1960s. This tumultuous era provided the artist with ample inspiration for his potent and poignant works that respond to the civil rights movement, the Vietnam War, and the work of Martin Luther King Jr. In the ensuing decades, Whitten’s shape-shifting style transformed and evolved, encompassing abstract and highly textured canvases; paintings with surfaces “processed” by rakes, squeegees, and other tools; and mosaic-like, mixed-media compositions that incorporate paint compounds transformed into tiles. Today, Whitten continues to respond to current events and pay homage to friends and public figures in his highly personalized yet incredibly approachable manner of abstraction.

The exhibition is organized by the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego.

Also on view May 16–August 2, 2015 is the exhibition Catherine Opie: Portraits and Landscapes, an exhibition of approximately 50 recent works by the influential American photographer.

ABOUT JACK WHITTEN
Born and raised in Bessemer, Alabama, Whitten moved to New York City (where he is still based) in 1960 to attend the Cooper Union.

Whitten's work has been exhibited in the Whitney Annuals of 1969 and 1972, the landmark exhibition Contemporary Black Artists in America (1971) at the Whitney Museum of American Art; Energy/Experimentation: Black Artists and Abstraction 1964–1980 at the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; MOCA, Los Angeles; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond; and High Times Hard Times: New York Painting 1967-1975, organized by Independent Curators International; as well as in the Wexner Center’s 2013 presentation of Blues for Smoke.

EXHIBITION-RELATED EVENTS

Whitten will share the stage for the first time with photographer Catherine Opie in a free talk moderated by acclaimed art critic Tyler Green, host of the Modern Art Notes Podcast. This dynamic conversation takes place Friday, May 15 at 5 pm. After the talk, an exhibition preview will be held from 6 to 9 pm. Walk-in tours, free with gallery admission, will be available throughout the run of the exhibitions beginning May 23.