As chair of the Art Department of the Yale School of Art and Architecture from 1963 to 1969, Tworkov envisioned a new era…As the historian Irving Sandler wrote, Tworkov turned Yale into “an arena of competing ideas and attitudes [...] In keeping with the diversity of New York art in the sixties, he made the school responsive as never before.” As Brice Marden remarked, “We were kept off-balance and confused; we weren’t being taught some way to paint.”
–Jason Andrew, Of the Stark and Spartan: Tworkov in the 70s
Jack Tworkov, Provincetown, 1960. Photo: Marvin P. Lazarus
Courtesy Estate of Jack Tworkov, New York.
The abstract painting is more nearly the true icon of our time even if it’s only at times the icon of despair, or nothingness…abstract art is perhaps the nirvana towards which I reach.
–Jack Tworkov, Journal Entry, July 22, 1966, published in Mira Schor, ed., The Extreme of the Middle: Writings of Jack Tworkov (Yale Unviersity Press, New Haven & London: 2009), p. 393
Jack Tworkov, Study for Red and Green with a Yellow Stripe, c. 1961
Oilstick on paper, 24 1/8 x 18 in (61.3 x 45.7 cm)
(Catalogue Raisonné No. 347)
© 2023 Estate of Jack Tworkov / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY
Inquire
... as you can tell by looking at the paintings, what ultimately mattered was sustaining the activity of making pictures. The emphasis in his expressionistic works of the 1950s might have been on the sources of human spontaniety, but after the mid-1960s, it shifted to the problem of renewing the impetus to act, for in the long view of life the problem is not how to begin but how to continue on a chosen course of action for as long as the commitment to that action demands.
–Kenneth Baker, Introduction: Painting Without Pretext, Catalogue Essay for Jack Tworkov: Paintings, 1928–1982, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (1987)
Jack Tworkov, Self Portrait, 1965
Charcoal on paper 22 1/8 x 17 in (56.2 x 43.2 cm)
(Catalogue Raisonné No. 1270)
© 2023 Estate of Jack Tworkov / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY
Installation view: André Emmerich Gallery, 1991
Exhibited:
– Adams-Middleton Gallery, Dallas, TX, Jack Tworkov (1900-1982): The Early and Late Years, April 4–May 11, 1985.
– André Emmerich Gallery, New York, NY, Jack Tworkov: Paintings from 1930 to 1981, February 7–March 9, 1991 (no. 5, ill. in color pl. 5).
– Boston College Museum of Art, Chestnut Hill, MA, Jack Tworkov 1935-1982: An Abstract Expressionist Inventing Form (curated by Alston Conley), February 2–May 23, 1994 (no. 15, ill in color, pl. 15).
– André Emmerich Gallery, New York, NY, Painting in Provincetown: Milton Avery, Hans Hofmann, Jack Tworkov, June–July 1998 (ill in color in brochure).
– Mitchell-Innes & Nash and Ameringer/Howard/Yohe, New York, NY, Jack Tworkov: Red, White and Blue, March 6–April 13, 2002 (no. 20, ill in color, pl. 20).
– Van Doren Waxter, Art Basel, Miami Beach, FL., Art Basel Art Fair, December 2–4, 2021.
Publication History:
– Rathus, Spencer. Psychology. Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1981, ill.
– Lloyd, Ann Wilson. "Jack Tworkov at Emmerich." Art in America 79:12 (December 1991), mentioned, p. 120.
– Temin, Christine. "Jack Tworkov's different strokes." The Boston Globe, Tuesday, February 8, 1994, ill. in b/w, p. 61, mentioned p. 66.
– Lucie-Smith, Edward. Art Today. London: Phaidon, 1995, p. 53, ill.
