Provenance
Private Collection, Chicago (acquired directly from the artist)
Exhibited
Los Angeles, The Museum of Contemporary Art; New York, The Whitney Museum of American Art, Blues for Smoke, October 21, 2012 - April 28, 2013, p. 34 (illustrated)
Catalogue Essay
ED CLARK
Born 1926, New Orleans, LA
Lives and works in Detroit, MI

1953, L’Academie de la Grande Chaumière, Paris
1951, BA The Art Institute of Chicago, IL

Selected honors: Legends and Legacy Award (2013); Congressional Achievement Award (1994); Award in Painting, National Endowment for the Arts (1985); Award in Painting, National Endowment for the Arts (1972); Prix d’Othon Friesz, Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Musée du Louvre, Paris, France (1955)
Selected museum exhibitions and performances: include Museum of Modern Art, New York; Tate Modern, London; Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville; Whitney Museum for American Art, New York; N’Namdi Center for Contemporary Art, Detroit; The Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn
Selected public collections: Albright-Knox, Buffalo; Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago; Brooklyn Museum, NY; Detroit Institute of the Arts, Detroit; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Saint Louis Art Museum, Saint Louis; Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Washington; Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

Though associated with Abstract Expressionism, Ed Clark has continuously and audaciously transformed his artistic language over a career spanning six decades. His experiments with color, form, and shaped canvas are a testament to his restless inventiveness, a quality inspired by the cultures of the many places he’s resided in and travelled to, including New York, Paris, Morocco, Brazil, Greece, Yucatan, Martinique, Nigeria, and China. From his figurative works, including Stove, to his egg-shaped abstract pieces, Clark has always imbued his art with a delicate balance of colorful energy and peaceful tranquility.

Born in pre-Civil Rights era New Orleans, Clark joined the Air Force at age 17 and served in Guam during World War II. Afterwards, he utilized the GI Bill by enrolling in the School of The Art Institute of Chicago and later the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris. Perceiving that his race would impact the future of his career less in France than in the United States – he noted that “The French never put race on ID cards”– Clark decided to reside in Paris even after the expiration of his GI bill before settling in New York in the late 1950s.

As a key player in both the New York and Paris art spheres, it is fitting that Clark’s influences range from Paul Cézanne to Willem de Kooning to Nicolas de Staël. Barry Schwabsky, New York critic of The Nation, deemed Clark “one of the best living painters… Paint as a literal, physical presence and as a trace of the artist’s mental and physical activity becomes inseparable from the evocation of the glory of light.” Clark intended for his work to transcend race, politics, and worldly identity. “Art is not subject to political games; its importance elevates it above any racial difference,” Clark asserted. “All men of talent, of noble spirit, can make it.”
Artist Biography
Ed Clark
American • 1926 - 2019
Born in pre-Civil Rights era New Orleans, Clark joined the Air Force at age 17 and served in Guam during World War II. Afterwards, he utilized the GI Bill by enrolling in the School of The Art Institute of Chicago and later the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris. Perceiving that his race would impact the future of his career less in France than in the United States – he noted that “The French never put race on ID cards”– Clark decided to reside in Paris even after the expiration of his GI bill before settling in New York in the late 1950s.
Though associated with Abstract Expressionism, Ed Clark continuously and audaciously transformed his artistic language over a career spanning six decades. His experiments with color, form, and shaped canvas are a testament to his restless inventiveness, a quality inspired by the cultures of the many places he’s resided in and traveled to, including New York, Paris, Morocco, Brazil, Greece, Yucatan, Martinique, Nigeria, and China. From his figurative works to his egg-shaped abstract pieces, Clark has always imbued his art with a delicate balance of colorful energy and peaceful tranquility.
View More Works

2

Ed Clark

The Stove

signed and dated "Clark 52" lower left
oil on canvas
40 x 29 in. (101.6 x 73.7 cm.)
Executed in 1952.

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Untitled Abstract
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The Stove
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Abstraction No. 2
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AMERICAN AFRICAN AMERICAN

New York Selling Exhibition 10 January - 8 February 2019

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Provenance

Exhibited

Catalogue Essay

Artist Biography

Ed Clark

2

Ed Clark

The Stove

AMERICAN AFRICAN AMERICAN

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