Richard Hennessy Abstract Paintings

Richard Hennessy, 1972. Born in Rochester, NY, in 1941, Hennessy began as a gifted concert pianist studying at the Eastman School of Music from 1954-1959. He went on to study art history at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, from 1963-66, after which he began his career as a fine artist. His early paintings were quickly admired and supported by Henry Geldzahler, curator of Modern Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. His first exhibition was in 1969 at Olivier Bernier Inc. NYC, followed in 1970 by a show at the Tibor De Nagy Gallery, also in NYC. Over the years he has shown in San Francisco, Indiana, Arizona, Florida, and at other prominent NYC galleries including Robert Miller, Hamilton, John Good and a retrospective at NYU’s Grey Gallery. Aaron Copeland, America’s foremost composer, and John Ashberry, America’s premier poet, were early champions of his work. He is in NYC collections of the Brooklyn, Metropolitan, Guggenheim and Whitney Museums, as well as the Copland Manor house in Cortland NY, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Albright Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo and many others. He has been the recipient of grants from the Pollock Krasner Foundation and the Ann & Erlo Van Waveron Foundations. Art critic Roberta Smith called his work “ironic, lyrical abstraction.” Critic Christopher Scott: “Hennessy has, unlike many modern artists, not ignored the history of art, and his works are enriched by the paintings, sculptures, buildings, decorative arts, photographs, films, music and literature that he immersed himself in. He has harnessed the power of his talent and intelligence for artistic purposes leading to virtuoso maximalist. He has applied this intelligence with the same adventurousness of spirit visible in the early abstractions of Hans Hofmann and Willem de Kooning, spontaneous yet precise.” HIs work would go well in a 1980's Memphis Milano interior. He showed at MoMA with Lynda Benglis, Jonathan Borofsky, Billy Copley, Eric Fischl, Deborah Kass, Elizabeth Murray, Yoko Ono, Sean Scully In 1982. SELECT GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2014 GEOFFREY YOUNG GALLERY GT. BARRINGTON, MA ELEMENTS OF STYLE 2007 VILLE DE REIMS GLOBAL BOOKS: LES LIVRES D'ARTISTE DE GERVAIS JASSAUD 2006 SNUG HARBOR CULTURAL CENTER STATEN ISLAND, NY ABSTRACT LANDSCAPES 2000 THE HECKSCHER MUSEUM OF ART HUNTINGTON, NY AARON COPLAND USA 1997 ESPACE CULTUREL DE TINQUEUX FRANCE LA TENTATION DU LIVRE 1992 COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY NEW YORK THE ARTIST, THE WRITER AND THE BOOK DESIGN (ARTISTS'S BOOKS FROM COLLECTIF GÉNÉRATION) 1992 MARGULIES/TAPLIN GALLERY MIAMI GROUP SHOW 1991 NINA FREUDENHEIM GALLERY RICHARD HENNESSY AND JEFFREY WASSERMAN 1991 FRENCH CULTURAL SERVICES NEW YORK 1991 ANDRE EMMERICH GALLERY NEW YORK ABSTRACT PAINTING: THE 90'S 1990 MARTA CERVERA GALLERY NEW YORK THE PAINTER AND HIS OCCASION, CURATED BY ALAN JONES...

The artist Richard Hennessy creates pictorial space as a complex and contradictory entity. The colorful ground uses alternately concave and convex forms and negative space to indicat...

Richard Hennessy, 1972. Born in Rochester, NY, in 1941, Hennessy began as a gifted concert pianist studying at the Eastman School of Music from 1954-1959. He went on to study art his...