FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


Frank Lobdell

Paintings from the 1940s-50s

Frank Lobdell & Richard Diebenkorn

Works on Paper

November 23 - December 21, 2002

Charles Cowles Gallery is pleased to present its first exhibition of FRANK LOBDELL's work. In a rare opportunity to show LOBDELL's early paintings, we hope to reintroduce his impressive oeuvre to a New York audience. His continued prominence in the San Francisco art scene since enrolling at the then California School of Fine Arts in 1947 has made him a legend in the Bay Area where his work has been shown regularly in gallery and museum exhibitions since 1948. He was exhibited in the celebrated Ferus Gallery's inaugural show (1957) in Los Angeles and in New York, Martha Jackson included him in her pioneering stable throughout the 1950s and 60s.

A contemporary of Clifford Still and Mark Rothko, FRANK LOBDELL brought a West-Coast sensibility to Abstract Expressionism. His canvases are encrusted with thick impasto in some areas and thin glazes layered in others. As Walter Hopps states in his 1966 catalogue essay, "…LOBDELL's art immediately reveals his commitment to an evolving, intuitive, painterly process."

LOBDELL's works are in distinguished museum collections including the American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York; National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC; Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Charles Cowles Gallery will also be showing a selection of figurative drawings by RICHARD DIEBENKORN and FRANK LOBDELL. Both part of the Bay Area Figurative School, they were also close friends, and often spent afternoons together sketching the same models.

The exhibition will be on view at the Charles Cowles Gallery, 537 West 24th Street, between 10th and 11th Avenues in Chelsea. Hours are 10am to 6pm, Tuesday through Saturday.

There will be a reception for the artist on Thursday, November 21 from 6-8 pm.

For further information or photographs, please contact the gallery.

Above image: Frank Lobdell, 2 May 1949, 1949, oil on canvas, 48 x 36"