Shirley Gorelick Art

Susan Gorelick (American, 1924-2000), "Red Expulsion" A/P, Abstract Etching signed, titled and numbered in Pencil, 19.50 x 27.88 (Image: 17.25 x 23.50) Late 20th Century Colors: Orange, Black, Red Shirley Gorelick (1924–2000) was an American artist who evolved a distinctive realist technique that allowed her to create penetrating psychological portraiture, often on a large scale. She described her early work as a contemporary reinterpretation of the figure “within the framework of a personal humanism” and her later work as “psychological portraiture.” She earned her B.A. at Brooklyn College (1944), where she studied under Serge Chermayeff, and her M.A. at Teachers College, Columbia University (1947). She briefly studied with Hans Hofmann in Provincetown and Betty Holliday in Port Washington. Her early work was influenced by Cubism, Surrealism, and Abstract Expressionism, but she became uncomfortable with the distortion of the human figure in modern art. Gorelick emerged as a strong figurative artist with her first solo show, held at the Angeleski Gallery in 1961, where she exhibited an array of truncated nudes in the prevailing abstract expressionist idiom. Several years later, using the visual language of twentieth-century realism, Gorelick reinterpreted Giorgione’s Concert Champêtre, Pablo Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, and the Three Graces. Most notably, Three Graces IV and Three Graces V feature the repeated forms of a nude, middle-aged African-American model. As Gorelick’s work evolved in the 1970s, the direct associations with her artistic forebears lessened, although she continued to be inspired by them. Blending the theme of the Three Graces and the Tahitian nudes of Paul Gauguin, Gorelick created Westchester Gauguin (Three Sisters), a series of paintings that portray suburban adolescents amid an overgrowth of pachysandra. She further recast the Three Graces in Willy, Billy Joe, and Leroy (1973), a compelling portrait of three African-American men in the artist’s studio. Inspired by Paul Cézanne’s Card Players, Gorelick also painted Chess Game (1972), in which she depicted a group of men playing chess...

Susan Gorelick ( American, 1924-2000) "Growth 1" A/P, Abstract Etching signed, titled and numbered in Pencil 15.25 x 11.50, Late 20th Century Colors: Gold, Black Shirley Gorelick (1924–2000) was an American artist who evolved a distinctive realist technique that allowed her to create penetrating psychological portraiture, often on a large scale. She described her early work as a contemporary reinterpretation of the figure “within the framework of a personal humanism” and her later work as “psychological portraiture.” She earned her B.A. at Brooklyn College (1944), where she studied under Serge Chermayeff, and her M.A. at Teachers College, Columbia University (1947). She briefly studied with Hans Hofmann in Provincetown and Betty Holliday in Port Washington. Her early work was influenced by Cubism, Surrealism, and Abstract Expressionism, but she became uncomfortable with the distortion of the human figure in modern art. Gorelick emerged as a strong figurative artist with her first solo show, held at the Angeleski Gallery in 1961, where she exhibited an array of truncated nudes in the prevailing abstract expressionist idiom. Several years later, using the visual language of twentieth-century realism, Gorelick reinterpreted Giorgione’s Concert Champêtre, Pablo Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, and the Three Graces. Most notably, Three Graces IV and Three Graces V feature the repeated forms of a nude, middle-aged African-American model. As Gorelick’s work evolved in the 1970s, the direct associations with her artistic forebears lessened, although she continued to be inspired by them. Blending the theme of the Three Graces and the Tahitian nudes of Paul Gauguin, Gorelick created Westchester Gauguin (Three Sisters), a series of paintings that portray suburban adolescents amid an overgrowth of pachysandra. She further recast the Three Graces in Willy, Billy Joe, and Leroy (1973), a compelling portrait of three African-American men in the artist’s studio. Inspired by Paul Cézanne’s Card Players, Gorelick also painted Chess Game (1972), in which she depicted a group of men playing chess...