Hear About the Life and Work of the Singular Forrest Bess This Saturday

by Glasstire February 26, 2019
Forrest Bess

Forrest Bess, “Untitled,” 1957. Oil on canvas.

On Saturday, March 2 at 11 a.m. at The Printing Museum in Houston, the Menil Collection’s Clare Elliott will give a talk on the life and work of the painter Forrest Bess (1911-1977), a compelling and singular American artist from Bay City, Texas. The talk is organized by the Visual Arts Alliance, Houston.

Bess, an eccentric college dropout, holds a unique position in American art history. He lived in almost total isolation as a commercial fisherman at his family’s fishing camp at Chinquapin, which is near Bay City. He painted during his off hours, and though he preferred to be alone, he eventually showed his work in regional shows, and was then picked up by the famed Betty Parsons Gallery in New York City, where he had a number of solo shows in the 1950s and ’60s.

In 2013, The Menil Collection presented the solo retrospective Forrest Bess: Seeing Things Invisible (“the first retrospective exhibition of the artist’s work in more than twenty years”), curated by Ms. Elliott, Associate Research Curator at the Menil Collection. That year Ms. Elliot also published her accompanying book on Bess.

Stuart Shave/Modern Art in London presented a solo show of Bess’ work in its Helmet Row space in winter of 2018.

The lecture is free and open to the public. For more info, please go here.

0 comment

You may also like

Leave a Comment

Funding generously provided by: