Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 3

Thornton Willis
Working Man, Large Oil Painting by Thornton Willis 1981

1981

About the Item

Artist: Thornton Willis, American (1936 - ) Title: Working Man Year: 1981 Medium: Acrylic on Canvas, signed and titled verso Size: 84 x 94 in. (213.36 x 238.76 cm) The Wedge Paintings: After returning to New York City, Willis began his formalist compositions exploring Form and Field ambiguity that led to his “Wedge” series, 1974-1982. During this time he co-founded “Review: Artists on Art” with his wife. He showed his work at the Holly Solomon Gallery, NYC, in 1976, and in 1979 Thornton Willis won a Guggenheim Fellowship for painting. In the same year his work was included in the controversial exhibition “American Painting: The Eighties, a critical interpretation” organized and curated by Barbara Rose.[6] The exhibition opened at the Grey Art Gallery, NYC and traveled first to The Houston Museum of Fine Arts, then to the American Center, Paris, France before traveling around the world as a United States Ambassadorial show to over twenty other countries. In 1979, Thornton Willis exhibited his “Wedge” Paintings at the 55 Mercer Street Gallery where the work attracted the attention of British collectors, Robin Symes, and Charles and Doris Saatchi. He showed the “Wedge” paintings at the Sidney Janis Gallery, NYC, in 1980 is an exhibition entitled “Seven Young Americans” curated by Sam Hunter which included friend and fellow artist Sean Scully. In 1980 he had a one-person show at the Oscarsson Hood Gallery who would represent the artist until 1986. In 1980 he met the European dealer, Claes Nordenhake, and exhibited his “Wedge” paintings in Malmo, Sweden, Gothenburg, Sweden and Helsinki, Finland and Geneva, Switzerland. In 1982, Willis began a series of overlapping “wedges’ or “double wedges’ that allowed exploration of the vertical colored bands created where the edges met. “Striped Suit”, 1982, a large double wedge canvas was featured on the cover of Arts Magazine with an essay by Steven Henry Madoff, Looking for Thornton Willis: A Treatise. With the re-opening of the Museum of Modern Art, NYC, in 1984, Willis exhibited Red Warrior in An International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture.
  • Creator:
    Thornton Willis (1936)
  • Creation Year:
    1981
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 84 in (213.36 cm)Width: 94 in (238.76 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    Long Island City, NY
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU4663410591
More From This SellerView All
  • Nereides Series IX, Abstract Expressionist Acrylic Painting by Elwood Howell
    By Elwood Howell
    Located in Long Island City, NY
    Artist: Elwood Howell, American (1933 - ) Title: Nereides Series IX Year: 1979 Medium: Acrylic on Canvas, signed l.r. Size: 49 x 66 in. (124.46 x 167.64 cm)
    Category

    1970s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

  • Parallels on Peach, Large Painting by Nick Wallis
    By Nick Wallis
    Located in Long Island City, NY
    Artist: Nick Wallis, American XXth Title: Parallels on Peach Year: circa 1980 Medium: Acrylic on Canvas, signed l.r. Size: 60 x 48 in. (152.4 x 121.92 cm)
    Category

    1980s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

  • More Afterthoughts 12, Large Abstract Painting by Wallis
    By Nick Wallis
    Located in Long Island City, NY
    Artist: Nick Wallis, American XXth Title: More Afterthoughts 12 Year: circa 1980 Medium: Acrylic on Canvas, signed l.r. Size: 30 x 60 in. (76.2 x 152.4 cm)
    Category

    1980s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

  • More Afterthoughts 9, Large Abstract Painting by Nick Wallis
    By Nick Wallis
    Located in Long Island City, NY
    Artist: Nick Wallis, American XXth Title: More Afterthoughts 9 Year: circa 1980 Medium: Acrylic on Canvas, signed l.r. Size: 47.5 x 60 in. (120.65 x 152.4 cm)
    Category

    1980s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

  • Abstract Composition I, Abstract Expressionist Painting by Jenik Cook
    By Jenik Cook
    Located in Long Island City, NY
    Artist: Jenik Cook, American (1940 - ) Title: Abstract Composition I Year: 2012 Medium: Oil on Canvas, signed and dated l.l. and verso Size: 24 x 36 in. (60.96 x 91.44 cm)
    Category

    1980s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

  • Abstract Composition II, Abstract Expressionist Painting by Jenik Cook
    By Jenik Cook
    Located in Long Island City, NY
    Artist: Jenik Cook, American (1940 - ) Title: Abstract Composition II Year: 2011 Medium: Oil on Canvas, signed and dated l.l. and verso Size: 24 x 36 in. (60.96 x 91.44 cm)
    Category

    1980s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

You May Also Like
  • A Set of 12 Contemporary Framed Abstract Paintings Blue White Museum Collection
    By Monica Angle
    Located in Buffalo, NY
    A set of 12 original mixed media monotype and painting mixed media works by American contemporary artist Monica Angle. These pieces were inspired by the changing light throughout th...
    Category

    2010s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Paper, Acrylic, Watercolor

  • Phenomena Prism Mirror by Paul Jenkins - Abstract painting
    By Paul Jenkins
    Located in London, GB
    *UK BUYERS WILL PAY AN ADDITIONAL 5% IMPORT DUTY ON TOP OF THE ABOVE PRICE Phenomena Prism Mirror by Paul Jenkins (1923-2012) Acrylic on canvas 147.3 x 1...
    Category

    1980s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

  • Phenomena Spectrum Guardian by Paul Jenkins, Abstract Expressionist artist
    By Paul Jenkins
    Located in London, GB
    Phenomena Spectrum Guardian by Paul Jenkins (1923 - 2012) Acrylic on canvas 76 x 101.5 cm (29 ⁷/₈ x 40 inches) Signed lower middle Paul Jenkins Executed in 1970 Provenance: Gallerie Iris Wazzau, Davos, Switzerland Private collection, Cologne, Germany Artist biography: Born at Kansas City in Missouri (USA), the multi-media artist, poet and playwright Paul Jenkins studied at the Kansas City Art Institute and the Art Students League in New York City. After his discharge from military service at the end of February 1946, he briefly studied playwriting with dramatist George McCalmon at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh. Thereafter, Jenkins spent four years studying with Japanese American artist Yasuo Kuniyoshi in New York City. His first solo exhibitions were held at Studio Paul Facchetti in Paris in 1954 and the Martha Graham Gallery in New York City in 1956. Over the past thirty years, numerous retrospectives have been curated across the globe and Jenkins’ work can found in national collections from Europe and the United States to Israel, Australia and Japan. The diversity of his work springs from Jenkins’ wealth of eclectic influences. Some of his earliest works included what he called "interior landscapes" influenced by ancient natural forms like the caves he visited in the Ozark Mountains in his native-Missouri. Frequent student visits to the Frick Collection in New York fostered a love of the great masters: Bellini, Holbein, Vermeer, Rembrandt, de la Tour, Turner and Goya. In compliment, lingering student visits to the renowned Eastern collection of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City evoked powerful sympathy for a monumental Chinese fresco...
    Category

    1970s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Acrylic

  • Celtic Song. Contemporary Abstract Expressionist Painting
    By Patricia McParlin
    Located in Brecon, Powys
    Patricia McParlin, is an award winning British artist who lives and works in Wales. She studied at The University of Wales and The West Wales School of the Arts. She has recently b...
    Category

    2010s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Oil, Acrylic

  • Demit Omphroy - Conversation, Painting 2022
    Located in Greenwich, CT
    “Conversation” represents the defining moment that one has with themselves around the decision to stay or leave the relationship. It is the final internal conversation where one has ...
    Category

    2010s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Canvas, Paint, Cotton Canvas, Acrylic

  • "Beige feeling" quadriptych abstraction, beige, brown, raw canvas, coffee
    Located in Zofingen, AG
    Original art by Lesia Danilina. Abstract acrylic painting on canvas quadriptych "Beige feelings" consists of 4 pictures "Achievement", "Golden ratio", "Characters" and "Trace". The ...
    Category

    2010s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

    Materials

    Coffee, Acrylic, Canvas

Recently Viewed

View All