Ross Bleckner
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Biography
Born 1949 in New York
Lives and works in New York
Ross Bleckner’s paintings are an investigation of change, loss, and memory, often suggesting meditations on the body, health and disease, much like a memento mori. His immersive paintings, whether pure abstraction of stripes and dots or representations of birds, flowers, and brains, elicit a powerful hypnotic and dizzying effect. Smoothly layered on the canvas surface against a darker background, Bleckner’s famous multicolored volumetric circles or flowers look like they are viewed under a microscope.
Ross Bleckner rose to prominence in New York in the 1980s. To this day, he is the youngest artist to receive a midcareer retrospective at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, at the age of 45. Recent exhibitions include the Neues Museum Nürnberg; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Martin Gropius Bau, Berlin; Reina Sofia, Madrid; L.A. County Museum, Los Angeles; Kunstmuseum Luzern; and Zentrum Paul Klee, Bern.
His paintings can be found in numerous major museum collections, such as the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Astrup Fearnley Collection, Oslo; Sammlung Goetz, Munich; Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid.
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Bleckner‘s flower paintings exude an unalienable contradiction. They are signs of life and hope, blurred and shaded at the same time, constantly threatened by the darker background of the paintings. It is precisely the conventionality of the floral still life motif, that brings forth a paradox in these images, which brings grief together with a touch of frivolity.
– Julian Heynen
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The main thing for me is how the image is disembodied, almost vaporized, into this continuous pulsating glow that emanates from something.
– Ross Bleckner
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A flower has such a short life span; it blooms and it is so majestic at its height but then it just falls away. I find pleasure in painting them and then seeing what happens when they become just a trace of something left. I’ve always been amazed by what’s not there anymore.
– Ross Bleckner
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Works
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Ross BlecknerFace to the Sun, 2024Oil on linenSigned, titled and dated verso213.4 x 152.4 cm
84 x 60 inches -
Ross BlecknerEverytime I Read, 2023Oil on linenSigned, titled and dated verso213.4 x 152.4 cm
84 x 60 inches -
Ross BlecknerUntitled, 2022Oil on linenSigned, dated and titled verso183 x 183 cm
72 x 72 inches -
Ross BlecknerLove and Letting Go, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso198.1 x 167.6 cm
78 x 66 inches -
Ross BlecknerBurn Painting (Rooms Combined to Cheer), 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso243.8 x 182.9 cm
96 x 72 inches -
Ross BlecknerBurn Painting (Incorrect Astronomy), 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso243.8 x 182.9 cm
96 x 72 in -
Ross BlecknerBurn Painting (The World These Days), 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso243.8 x 182.9 cm
96 x 72 inches -
Ross BlecknerRam Dass, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso243.8 x 243.8 cm
96 x 96 inches -
Ross BlecknerDivided by Zero, 2020Oil on linenWork is unsigned. Hand-written artist number on verso.182.9 x 243.8 cm
72 x 96 inches -
Ross BlecknerMeditation, 2006Oil on linen243.8 x 304.8 cm
96 x 120 inches -
Ross BlecknerOutside Her Window, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso198.1 x 167.6 cm
78 x 66 inches -
Ross BlecknerOutside His Window, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso198.1 x 167.6 cm
78 x 66 inches -
Ross BlecknerBirds, 1999
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Ross BlecknerAfter/All/These/Years, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated versoFour parts, each part:
243.8 x 182.9 cm
96 x 72 inches -
Ross BlecknerMy Eyes Are Clouds, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso273 x 273 cm
108 x 108 in -
Ross BlecknerDome, 2016Oil on linen213.4 x 213.4 cm
84 x 84 inches -
Ross BlecknerUntitled, 2019Oil on linenSigned and dated verso76.5 x 76.5 cm
30 x 30 inches -
Ross BlecknerUntitled, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso76.5 x 76.5 cm
30 x 30 inches -
Ross BlecknerUntitled, 2020Oil on linenSigned and dated verso76.5 x 76.5 cm
30 x 30 inches -
Ross BlecknerInheritance, 2003Oil on linen182.9 x 182.9 cm
72 x 72 inches -
Ross BlecknerSelective Behavior, 1999Oil on linensigned and dated verso213.4 x 152.4 cm
84 x 60 inches -
Ross BlecknerEnhancers, 2000Oil on linen182.9 x 213.4 cm
72 x 84 inches
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Exhibitions
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External Exhibitions
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Press
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Publications
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Video