Marlborough Graphics is pleased to present a virtual exhibition of the American painter, sculptor, and printmaker Adolph Gottlieb. The artist belonged to the group that famously established the theoretical foundations of the Abstract Expressionist movement in a 1943 letter written to The New York Times. Presented in this exhibition will be a grouping of eighteen graphic works that were printed by Marlborough in the late 1960s.

Gottlieb first began experimenting with printing when he refashioned a skirt pleating press into a printmaking press in 1932. In his early investigations into the medium, the artist would create the prints from the kitchen of his Brooklyn Heights home. Gottlieb joined Marlborough in 1964 which marked the beginning of the collaborative printmaking process between the artist and the gallery.

The exhibition will highlight prints from the Gottlieb’s Burst series, which he began in 1957 and continued to develop until his death in 1974. The Bursts are categorized by two zones; the top zone is comprised of a circular form and the bottom zone is inhabited by a gestural, swirling mass, typically executed in black. For Gottlieb, the dichotomy of these forces signifies the simultaneous existence of the polarities of the universe.

Throughout his career, Adolph Gottlieb had fifty-six solo exhibitions and was included in over two hundred group exhibitions. His works of art are in the collections of more than 140 major museums around the world. Gottlieb was accomplished as a painter, draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor. He designed and oversaw construction of a 1500 square-foot-stained glass façade for the Milton Steinberg Center in New York City in 1954, and he designed a suite of 18 stained glass windows for the Kingsway Jewish Center in Brooklyn. He was the first of his generation to have his art collected by the Museum of Modern Art (1946) and the Guggenheim Museum (1948). Gottlieb suffered a major stroke in 1970 that left him paralyzed except for his right arm and hand. He was voted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1972. He continued to paint and to exhibit his art until his death in March 1974.

From the Archives: Gottlieb’s 1972 Solo Exhibition at Marlborough