The Whispering LightRobert KipnissF o r t W a y n e M u s e u m o f A r t

Several years ago, while visiting the prestigious Harmon-Meek Gallery, in Naples, Florida, I was introduced to the work of Robert Kipniss. A series of landscapes graced a long wall in the gallery, each devoid of any human figure but unquestionably full of life: trees lush with feathery leaves, trees bared as their leaves fluttered away in the breeze, and an occasional building nestled into a sloping mass of shrubbery. Standing before these mysteriously serene paintings, I felt as though I had happened upon a special moment in time that might disappear if I so much as blinked. I knew that Robert’s work had to be in the Museum’s collection and, with some difficulty, I made a selection for gallery owner Bill Meek to ship to Fort Wayne.

Two years later, I planned my trip to Naples to coincide with Robert’s solo exhibition at Harmon-Meek and drove to the gallery from the airport. Upon arriving, I was overwhelmed to be standing in the midst of an entire gallery devoted to these elegant, contemplative landscapes. Bill left me on my own to soak all this in. Each painting, while related to the others, was a unique experience, and I slowly began to understand the subtlety of Robert’s visual vocabulary. Three hours later, Bill tapped me on the shoulder to remind me that the gallery would be closing soon. “But before we do, there’s a painting quite different that I would like to show you in my office,” Bill said. I followed him in and he pointed to a stunning still-life on an easel near the window. The signature was unmistakable: Kipniss. Bill explained that throughout his career Robert devoted more time to his remarkable landscapes but, nonetheless, produced masterful still-lifes which infused reality with an ethereal tone that is profoundly moving. Of all the wonderful paintings on the gallery walls, this still-life was my selection for the collection of the Fort Wayne Museum of Art.

These two paintings — and their very favorable reception by the Museum’s Collection Committee — ignited our desire to mount a major exhibition of paintings and prints that told the story of Robert Kipniss’s career and the evolution of his role in American art history. Robert and I began a series of telephone calls and long notes to define the shape and scope of the exhibition, and we both agreed that the final form of this great project would need to be developed in his New York studio in the midst of all the work. A date for that was arranged so that we would have ample time in which to make our decisions, and when that date came, we both discovered that our original concept was insufficiently ambitious. As we looked at painting after painting and print after print there in Robert’s studio, the exhibition doubled in size. There was simply so much excellent work that it seemed a shame not to expand the exhibition to fill three galleries. So we did. In doing so, I feel confident that we created an exhibition that speaks to Robert’s life as an artist. It is a beautiful and deep exhibition that stirs your soul. It is an exhibition to be taken in slowly in order to maximize your experience. I hope you are so moved as I have been.

In closing, I want to warmly thank Robert for making this fine work and sharing it with us, and for his very generous gift of more than one-hundred of his prints to establish the Robert Kipniss Print Archive at the Fort Wayne Museum of Art. I also want to thank Elizabeth Goings, my co-curator for this exhibition, and Tiffany Street, our Archives Research Curator, for their hard work in helping to bring this exhibition to fruition. Special thanks to Amanda Martin, our Vice President & COO, who oversaw the production of this publication, and Kaitlin Binkley, our Marketing Coordinator, who designed this publication. Thanks, as well, to Joslyn Elliott, our former Associate Curator of Exhibitions, who oversaw the logistics of this project through until the final stages of the exhibition’s preparation.

Charles A. Shepard IIICEO and Chief Curator

On the occasion of the exhibition Robert Kipniss: The Whispering Light, on display at the Fort Wayne Museum of Art October 29, 2016 - January 22, 2017.

Cover: Yellow Fields in Winter, Oil on Canvas, 381/6x34”, 2015Left: 78th Street and 5th Avenue, Oil on Panel, 46x36”, 1959

Afternoon II, Oil on Canvas, 21 1/4x30 1/8”, 2008April Winds, Oil on Canvas, 26x38”, 2011

Breezes III, Oil on Canvas, mounted on board, 13 3/4x15 3/4”, 2010Trees and Porch, Oil on Canvas, 34x28”, 2012

Evening Luminescence, Oil on Canvas, 15x25 1/8, 2014

Leaves III, Oil on Canvas, 28x34”, 2008 Still Life with Spoon and Fruit, Oil on Canvas Mounted on Board, 14x16”, 2007

Landscape with Six Trees, Oil on Canvas, 28 1/8x22”, 2015Forest Nocturne IV, Oil on Canvas, 20x18”, 2005-2009

One thing I have most wonderfully learned is that the greatest reward for making art is making art. The life of an artist is about the art.

In the beginning, getting a career started was very challenging, mostly because there was no sure way to do it, no rules, no guideposts; it was with trial and error that I gradually became established. Instinctively I knew that painting and exhibiting were the only essentials I needed, and whatever difficulties I encountered along my path, there was always the reassurance of working and learning.

My first one-artist show was in a 57th Street gallery in 1951, which was then the heart of the New York art world. Exhibiting and success are not the same and this first show made a very modest ripple. I was working and showing right from the start, and it never occurred to me to wonder if I would be successful or not. I was working and had become a small part of the art world. Life was good.

From just before I began regarding painting as a serious life pursuit I had started writing with the

conviction I would spend my life as a poet and a fiction writer. A year later I realized that while I had enjoyed painting as a past-time it would now share my desire to write as the focus of my energies for the rest of my life.

For about ten years my painting was lyrical, energetic, filled with bright color and charged with exuberance. At the same time my writing was dark, angry, at times a bit surreal, and often painful to create. When I stopped writing for a while in the early 1960s my paintings took on the characteristics of my former writing, and became infused with anger, a dark monochromatic palette, and occasionally slightly surreal themes: the added gravitas became immediately apparent. It was only a few years after this that my inner lyricism began to re-surface and meld with the darkness; this was the beginning of my mature style. Unexpectedly, my career took off.

I have lived my life as I dreamed of doing as a young man. Robert Kipniss

Self Portrait, Oil on Panel, 71/5x81/5”, 1958

Robert KipnissBorn: Brooklyn, New York, 1931

Selected Public Collections Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts, The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, CA Palace of the Legion of HonorAlbertina Museum, Vienna, Austria Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NYArkansas State University Permanent Collection, State University, ARThe Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, ILArt Museum of Western Virginia, Roanoke, VAArt Students League of New York, New York, NYBates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, METhe Berkshire Museum, Pittsfield, MABibliothèque nationale de France, ParisThe Boston Athenaeum, Boston, MABowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, METhe British Museum, LondonBrooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY Richard F. Brush Art Gallery, St. Lawrence University, Canton, NYThe Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, OHCanton Art Institute, Canton, OHCarnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PAThe Century Association, New York, NYThe Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OHColumbus Museum of Art, Columbus, OH Coos Art Museum, Coos Bay, OR De Cordova Museum and Sculpture Park, Lincoln, MA Cornell Fine Arts Museum, Winter Park, FLDavis Gallery, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, NYThe Denver Art Museum, Denver, COThe Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MIDubuque Museum of Art, Dubuque, IAElvehjem Museum of Art, University of Wisconsin-Madison, WIEverson Museum of Art, Syracuse, NYFederal Reserve Board Fine Arts Program, Washington, D.C.Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge,Cambridge, EnglandFlint Institute of Arts, Flint, MIFort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, INFrances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NYFrederick R. Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MNGibbes Museum of Art, Charleston, SCHarvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, MAThe Heckscher Museum of Art, Huntington, NY The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca, NYHofstra University Museum, Hempstead, NYThe Hunter Museum of Art, Chattanooga, TNIndianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, INIris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University, Stanford, CAJane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, NJ Joel and Lila Harnett Museum of Art, University of Richmond Museums, Richmond, VALakeview Museum of Arts and Sciences, Peoria, ILLawton Gallery, University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, Green Bay, WI Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CAMaier Museum of Art, Randolph College, Lynchburg, VAThe McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TXMemorial Art Gallery, Univ. of Rochester, Rochester, NYThe Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NYMinnesota Museum of American Art, Saint Paul, MNMint Museum of Art, Charlotte, NCThe Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson, MSMontclair Art Museum, Montclair, NJThe Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NYMunson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute, Utica, NYMuseo de Arte Moderno La Tertulia, Cali, ColombiaMuseum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RIMuseum of Fine Arts, Boston, MAThe Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TXNational Academy of Design, New York, NY

National Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C.The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MOThe New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, CTNew Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, LAThe New York Public Library, Print Collection, New York, NYOrlando Museum of Art, Orlando, FLPhiladelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PAPinakothek der Moderne, Staatliche Graphische Sammlung, MunichPortland Art Museum, Portland, OR Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers, London (diploma piece); housed at the Ashmolean Museum, OxfordSouthern Alleghenies Museum of Art, Loretto, PASpringfield Art Museum, Springfield, MOSpringfield Museum of Art, Springfield, OHSyracuse University Art Gallery, Syracuse, NYTacoma Art Museum, Tacoma, WAVictoria and Albert Museum, LondonVirginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VAWhitney Museum of American Art, New York, NYWichita Falls Museum and Art Center, Wichita Falls, TXWittenberg University, Springfield, OHYale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT

Selected One-Artist Shows Maier Museum of Art, Randolph College, Lynchburg, VA. 2016 Recent Acquisitions: Prints by Robert Kipniss Palitz Gallery, from the Syracuse University Art Galleries at Lubin House, New York, NY, 2015 (thirty prints from the museum’s collection) Wichita Falls Museum of Art, Wichita Falls, TX, 2015 (thirty-three prints from the museum’s collection)Harmon-Meek Gallery, Naples, FL, 2015, 2008, 2006, 2002The Old Print Shop, New York, New York, 2014, 2010, 2007, 2004 Weinstein Gallery, San Francisco, CA, 2013, 2011, 2009, 2007, 2004, 2002, 2001, 2000Franklin Riehlman Gallery, New York, NY, 2012Springfield Art Museum, Springfield, MO, 2010, 2003Acme Fine Art, Boston, MA, 2009The Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson, MS, 2008The McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX, 2007Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, FL, 2006Joel and Lila Harnett Museum of Art, University of Richmond Museums, Richmond, VA, 2006 New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, LA, 2006 (A retrospective of prints plus thirty-five recent paintings)Beadleston Gallery, New York, New York, 2003, 2001Wichita Falls Museum and Art Center, Wichita, TX, 1997 (A retrospective of paintings and graphics, 1950s-1990s)Bassenge Gallery, Berlin, Germany, 1999The Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, OH, 1999Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, TX, 1999Gerhard Wurzer Gallery, Houston, TX, 1999, 1997, 1988, 1986, 1981Molesey Gallery, East Molesey, Surrey, England, 1999, 1995Redfern Gallery, London, 1999, 1995Davidson Gallery, Seattle, WA, 1999, 1993, 1983, 1982Gallery New World, Düsseldorf, Germany, 1998, 1995Jane Haslem Gallery, Washington, D.C., 1998, 1976Hexton Gallery, New York, NY, 1997, 1996, 1995, 1994Venable/Neslage Gallery, Washington, D.C., 1997, 1995The Century Association, New York, NYk, 1996Taunhaus Gallery, Osaka and Kanazawa, Japan, 1994Theodore B. Donson Gallery, New York, NY, 1992OK Harris Works of Art, New York, NY, 1991Enatsu Gallery, Tokyo, Japan, 1990, 1988, 1987Illinois College, Jacksonville, IL, 1989Haller-Griffin Gallery, Washington Depot, CT, 1985 Jamie Szoke Gallery, New York, NY, 1985Springfield Museum of Art, Springfield, OH, 1985, 1983Nancy Teague Gallery, Seattle, WA, 1983, 1982ICA, Nagoya, Japan, 1984Payson/Weisberg Gallery, New York, NY, 1983, 1981Bruce Museum of Arts and Science, Greenwich, CT, 1981Gage Gallery, Washington, D.C., 1981Hirschl & Adler Galleries, New York, NY, 1980, 1977

Museo de Arte Moderno La Tertulia, Cali, Colombia, 1980, 1975Canton Art Institute, Canton, OH, 1979Associated American Artists (AAA), New York, NY, 1977 (A graphics retrospective, 1967-1977)G.W. Einstein Gallery, New York, NY, 1977, 1976Galeria de Arte, Lima, Peru, 1977Galeria San Diego, Bogota, Colombia, S.A., 1977, 1975“9” Galeria de Arte, Lima, Peru, 1976Centro de Arte Actual, Pereira, Colombia, 1975Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, MI, 1975Xochipili Gallery, Rochester, MI, 1975FAR Gallery, New York, NY, 1975, 1972, 1970, 1968The Contemporaries, New York, NY, 1967, 1966, 1960, 1959Allen R. Hite Institute, University of Louisville, KY, 1965Alan Auslander Gallery, New York, NY, 1963Harry Salpeter Gallery, New York, NY, 1953Joe Gans Gallery, New York, NY, 1951

HonorsThe Artists’ Fellowship, New York, NY, 2010The Benjamin West Clinedinst Memorial Medal For lifetime Achievement in Art

Society of American Graphic Artists, New York, NY, 2007, Lifetime achievement award

Elected to: Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers, London, 1998National Academy of Design, New York, NY, 1980

Illinois College, Jacksonville, IL, Honorary Doctorate, 1989

Wittenberg University, Springfield, OH, Honorary Doctorate, 1979

PublicationsRobert Kipniss: Paintings and Poetry 1950-1964 with essays by Robert Kipniss; Marshall Price, curator at the National Academy; and Robin Magowan, poet Published by the Artist Book Foundation, New York 2013

Robert Kipniss: A Working Artist’s Life a memoir by Robert Kipniss, published by The University Press of New England, Hanover and London, 2011

Robert Kipniss: Paintings 1950-2005 with essays by John Bullard, director of the New Orleans Museum of Art, and Richard Boyle, art historianPublished by Hudson Hills Press, New York and Manchester, VT 2007

Robert Kipniss: Intaglios 1982-2004 By Trudie Grace, curator of works on paper at the National Academy, New York, and Thomas Piche, Jr. senior curator at The Everson Museum, Syracuse, New York

Seen in Solitude: Robert Kipniss Prints from the James F. White Collection with a Foreword by E. John Bullard, director of the New Orleans Museum of Art; an essay by James F. White; and a text by Daniel Piersol, deputy director of programs, The Mississippi Museum of Art Published by the New Orleans Museum of Art 2005 This publication was in conjunction with the exhibition, Seen in Solitude which in 2006 re-opened the New Orleans Museum six months after the devastation wrought by hurricane Katrina

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This activity made possible, in part, with support from the Indiana Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency