Seymour rosofsky biography of christopher
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Seymour Rosofsky
American painter
Seymour Rosofsky (1924–1981) was an American artist, who has been described as one of the key figures in twentieth-century Chicago art.[1][2] He emerged in the late 1940s at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (BFA, 1949; MFA, 1951), one of several G.I. Bill veterans, including Leon Golub, Cosmo Campoli and H. C. Westermann, who would join Don Baum, Dominick Di Meo, June Leaf, and Nancy Spero to form the influential movement later dubbed the "Monster Roster" bygd critic Franz Schulze, which was a precursor to the more well-known Chicago Imagists.[3][4][5][6] Like others in the group, Rosofsky was drawn to the unsettling, macabre side of Surrealism,[7] initially creating gestural, expressionist renderings of grotesque, existentially angst-ridden figures in isolated or uncomfortable situations, that gave way in the 1960s to more fantastical, observational paintings that e
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Review: Seymour Rosofsky/Elmhurst Art Museum
“Lady of the House – Venus”
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Among Chicago Imagist painters, Seymour Rosofsky (1924-1981) was both the most classically trained and the most puzzling.
A second generation, blue-collar Jewish kid from Chicago, Seymour’s talent was recognized early and he ended up studying oil painting with Boris Anisfeld at the Art Institute. He picked up that Russian’s dreamy, decorative style, which might be called classical but was hardly naturalistic. As Anisfeld once said “I always see a thing first in color and I paint what inom feel, not what I see.” Rosofsky also became an art-museum junkie, both in Chicago and Paris, drawing from a variety of primitive, post-impressionist, surrealist and expressionist art. But when he put it all together, it was all about himself. There’s a musty, cluttered, claustrophobic feeling about his work, with the viewer often placed in the role of the therapist puzzled by the highly emotional, confused world
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Smart Museum of Art
Spearheaded by Leon Golub, the group of artists dubbed the Monster Roster established the first unique Chicago style. Monster Roster, organized by the Smart Museum of Art, brings together approximately 60 major paintings, sculptures, and works on paper in order to provide the definitive account of the movement.
Join us for this first-of-its-kind exhibition and a free public opening celebration. Free and open to all. Featuring:
Josh Berman Trio
Improvised in-gallery performance inspired by the creative ferment of the Monster Roster era. Josh Berman (cornet), Jason Roebke (bass), and Frank Rosaly (percussion).
Memento
In-gallery spoken word prose and poetry inspired by the exhibition from the performance ensemble of Memoryhouse, a UChicago literary magazine.
Docent-led tours
Tours of exhibition highlights and docent favorites, with stops at Memento performances in-situ
A Monster history
A short video on the Monster Roster by