Ross Bleckner
Influential contemporary artist Ross Bleckner is renowned for his large-scale abstract and figurative paintings that convey themes of change, loss and memory. Using recurring symbolism such as flowers, birds, urns and candelabras, along with patterns like stripes and dots, Bleckner’s immersive works elicit a hypnotic effect while suggesting ideas related to the body, health and disease.
Born in 1949 in New York City, Bleckner later studied at New York University alongside artists such as Chuck Close and Sol LeWitt. He went on to study at the California Institute of the Arts, graduating with a Master of Fine Arts in 1973.
In 1979, he began exhibiting with Mary Boone Gallery. During the 1980s, Bleckner became one of New York’s most prominent emerging artists through paintings that tackled the emotional toll of the AIDS crisis, particularly on the gay community. Bleckner’s powerful works depicting multicolored volumetric circles, or “cells as seen under a microscope,” garnered acclaim from art critics and collectors. In 1995, he became the youngest artist to have a retrospective at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.
In recent years, Bleckner’s paintings, watercolors and abstract, landscape and still-life prints have continued to capture international attention. His works have been exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid, Kunstmuseum Luzern in Lucerne, the Zentrum Paul Klee in Bern and the Gropius Bau in Berlin.
Bleckner’s art is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh and the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.
On 1stDibs, discover a range of Ross Bleckner’s prints, paintings and drawings and watercolor paintings.
21st Century and Contemporary American Modern Ross Bleckner
Linen, Paint
Early 2000s Ukrainian Post-Modern Ross Bleckner
Acrylic, Paper
1990s Swiss Ross Bleckner
Wood
21st Century and Contemporary American Modern Ross Bleckner
Enamel
20th Century American Expressionist Ross Bleckner
Paint
Early 20th Century Austrian Jugendstil Ross Bleckner
Canvas
20th Century Ross Bleckner
Canvas
2010s American Ross Bleckner
Paint
21st Century and Contemporary American Organic Modern Ross Bleckner
Clay, Organic Material
21st Century and Contemporary Australian Tribal Ross Bleckner
Acrylic
21st Century and Contemporary American Modern Ross Bleckner
Paint, Paper
21st Century and Contemporary Canadian Post-Modern Ross Bleckner
Canvas
Early 2000s Canadian Modern Ross Bleckner
Canvas
21st Century and Contemporary American Ross Bleckner
