George Earl Ortman (October 17, 1926 – December 16, 2015) was an American painter, printmaker, constructionist and sculptor. His work has been referred to as

Neo-Dada Neo-Dada was a movement with audio, visual and literary manifestations that had similarities in method or intent with earlier Dada artwork. It sought to close the gap between art and daily life, and was a combination of playfulness, iconoclasm, a ...

, pop art,

minimalism In visual arts, music and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in post–World War II in Western art, most strongly with American visual arts in the 1960s and early 1970s. Prominent artists associated with minimalism include Don ...

and

hard-edge painting Hard-edge painting is painting in which abrupt transitions are found between color areas. Color areas are often of one unvarying color. The Hard-edge painting style is related to Geometric abstraction, Op Art, Post-painterly Abstraction, and C ...

. His constructions, built with a variety of materials and objects, deal with the exploration off visual language derived from geometry—geometry as symbol and sign. Ortman was represented by Greenspon in New York.

Background and education

Ortman was born in Oakland, California. His father was an electrician who learned his trade from his father, George Earl Ortman, who worked with

Thomas Edison Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847October 18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventio ...

in Chicago in the late nineteenth century. His mother, born Anna Katherine Noll, was born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. She came to the United States in 1914 to work as governess for the mayor of San Rafael, California. After completing high school, Ortman enlisted in the United States Naval Air Corps V-5 program. Upon his discharge in 1946, he studied at the California College of Arts and Crafts (now the

California College of the Arts California College of the Arts (CCA) is a private art school in San Francisco, California. It was founded in Berkeley, California in 1907 and moved to a historic estate in Oakland, California in 1922. In 1996 it opened a second campus in San ...

) (1947–1948). After several years, he moved to New York City, where he studied at the

Atelier 17 Atelier 17 was an art school and studio that was influential in the teaching and promotion of printmaking in the 20th century. Originally located in Paris, the studio relocated to New York during the years surrounding World War II. It moved back ...

, a printmaking school founded by the English painter and printmaker

Stanley William Hayter Stanley William Hayter (27 December 1901 – 4 May 1988) was an English painter and printmaker associated in the 1930s with surrealism and from 1940 onward with abstract expressionism. Regarded as one of the most significant printmakers of ...

(1949). Later that year, he left for Paris where he studied at the Atelier

André Lhote André Lhote (5 July 1885 – 24 January 1962) was a French Cubist painter of figure subjects, portraits, landscapes and still life. He was also active and influential as a teacher and writer on art. Early life and education Lhote was born ...

(1949–50). Upon his return to New York City he studied at the

Hans Hofmann Hans Hofmann (March 21, 1880 – February 17, 1966) was a German-born American painter, renowned as both an artist and teacher. His career spanned two generations and two continents, and is considered to have both preceded and influenced Abstrac ...

School of Fine Arts (1950–51).

Career

Ortman first exhibited in the

Salon de Mai The Salon de Mai (the '' May Salon'') is a group of French artists which formed in a café on the Rue Dauphine in Paris in 1943 during the German occupation of France.Ferrier, Jean-Louis. (Ed.) (1999) ''Art of the 20th Century''. Paris: Chene-Hache ...

in Paris in 1950. Upon his return to New York City he was invited to join the Artist' Club, a meeting place for artists whose members included early proponents of

Action painting Action painting, sometimes called "gestural abstraction", is a style of painting in which paint is spontaneously dribbled, splashed or smeared onto the canvas, rather than being carefully applied. The resulting work often emphasizes the physical a ...

and Color Field painting. In 1953 he had his first solo exhibition at the Tanager Gallery, one of the Tenth Street a co-operative galleries that together formed an avant-garde alternative to the more conservative 57th Street and Madison Avenue galleries. In 1954, he and actress

Julie Bovasso Julia Anne Bovasso (August 1, 1930 – September 14, 1991) was an American actress of stage, screen, and television. Life and career Bovasso was born in Brooklyn, New York and raised in the Bensonhurst neighborhood of that borough, the daughter ...

founded the Tempo Playhouse to perform contemporary European playwrights, including the first American showings of

Jean Genet Jean Genet (; – ) was a French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. In his early life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but he later became a writer and playwright. His major works include the novels ''The Thief's ...

Eugène Ionesco Eugène Ionesco (; born Eugen Ionescu, ; 26 November 1909 – 28 March 1994) was a Romanian-French playwright who wrote mostly in French, and was one of the foremost figures of the French avant-garde theatre in the 20th century. Ionesco inst ...

, and

Michel de Ghelderode Michel de Ghelderode (born Adémar Adolphe Louis Martens, 3 April 1898 – 1 April 1962) was an avant-garde Belgian dramatist, from Flanders, who spoke and wrote in French. His works often deal with the extremes of human experience, from death an ...

. In 1954 and 1960, he showed simplified geometric constructions at the

Stable Gallery The Stable Gallery, originally located on West 58th Street in New York City, was founded in 1953 by Eleanor Ward. The Stable Gallery hosted early solo New York exhibitions for artists including Marisol Escobar, Robert Indiana and Andy Warhol. His ...

. This work was viewed by

Donald Judd Donald Clarence Judd (June 3, 1928February 12, 1994) was an American artist associated with minimalism (a term he nonetheless stridently disavowed).Tate Modern websit"Tate Modern Past Exhibitions Donald Judd" Retrieved on February 19, 2009. In ...

as a precursor to

Minimalism In visual arts, music and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in post–World War II in Western art, most strongly with American visual arts in the 1960s and early 1970s. Prominent artists associated with minimalism include Don ...

. In July 1960 he married the artist, Conni Whidden. In 1965 Ortman was appointed artist in residence at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

, and was honored with a retrospective at the

Walker Art Center The Walker Art Center is a multidisciplinary contemporary art center in the Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is one of the most-visited modern and contemporary art museums in the United States and, t ...

in Minneapolis. In 1970 Ortman assumed the position of Head of the Painting Department at

Cranbrook Academy of Art The Cranbrook Educational Community is an education, research, and public museum complex in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. This National Historic Landmark was founded in the early 20th century by newspaper mogul George Gough Booth. It consists of Cr ...

Bloomfield Hills Bloomfield Hills is a small city (5.04 sq. miles) in Oakland County, Michigan, Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is a northern suburb of Metro Detroit and is approximately northwest of Downtown Detroit. Except a small southern bo ...

. His wife of 30 years died in 1991. The following year Ortman left Cranbrook. Returning to the East Coast, he moved to Castine, Maine, where he lives and works. In a catalogue essay for an exhibition of Ortman's work at Princeton University in 1967, American poet,

Stanley Kunitz Stanley Jasspon Kunitz (; July 29, 1905May 14, 2006) was an American poet. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress twice, first in 1974 and then again in 2000. Biography Kunitz was born in Worcester, Massac ...

, wrote: "Ortman's work could not have been produced except for an artist of bold analytical intelligence, with a sense of the usable past and an inexhaustible curiosity about the way the thing is made, the "sacred mystery." In ''Arts Yearbook 7'' (1964),

wrote: "Some of George Ortman's reliefs are three-dimensional enough to be objects. They seem to be games or models for some activity and suggest chance … They suggest probability theory. They are one of the few instances of completely unnaturalist art. They are concerned with a new area of experience, one which is relevant philosophically as well as emotionally." Ortman died on December 16, 2015 at the age of 89.George Ortman, Artist Whose Works Presaged Minimalism, Dies at 89
/ref>

Awards

* 2014 : Indiana University Thomas Hart Benton Medallion * 2008 :

Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation The Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation was established in 1976. It is an American nonprofit organization that provides funding for the arts. History The Gottlieb Foundation was established after Adolph Gottlieb’s death in 1974. Esther Gottlieb ...

Grant * 2003 : Lee Krasner Award for Lifetime Achievement (

Pollock-Krasner Foundation The Pollock-Krasner Foundation was established in 1985 for the purpose of providing financial assistance to individual working artists of established ability. It was established at the bequest of Lee Krasner, who was an American abstract expression ...

) * 1965 :

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

Selected museum collections

* The

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

, New York City, NY * The

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, often referred to as The Guggenheim, is an art museum at 1071 Fifth Avenue on the corner of East 89th Street on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. It is the permanent home of a continuously exp ...

, New York City, NY * The

Whitney Museum of American Art The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–1942), ...

, New York City, NY * The

National Academy of Design The National Academy of Design is an honorary association of American artists, founded in New York City in 1825 by Samuel Morse, Asher Durand, Thomas Cole, Martin E. Thompson, Charles Cushing Wright, Ithiel Town, and others "to promote the fin ...

, New York City, NY * The

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is an art museum beside the National Mall, in Washington, D.C., the United States. The museum was initially endowed during the 1960s with the permanent art collection of Joseph H. Hirshhorn. It was des ...

, Washington, DC * The

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...

, Washington, DC * The

Smithsonian American Art Museum The Smithsonian American Art Museum (commonly known as SAAM, and formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds o ...

, Washington, DC * The

New Jersey State Museum The New Jersey State Museum is located at 195-205 West State Street in Trenton, New Jersey. It serves a broad region between New York City and Philadelphia. The museum's collections include natural history specimens, archaeological and ethnograph ...

, Trenton, NJ * The

Newark Museum The Newark Museum of Art (formerly known as the Newark Museum), in Newark, Essex County, New Jersey, United States, is the state's largest museum. It holds major collections of American art, decorative arts, contemporary art, and arts of Asia, Af ...

, Newark, NJ * The

Oakland Museum of California The Oakland Museum of California or OMCA (formerly the Oakland Museum) is an interdisciplinary museum dedicated to the art, history, and natural science of California, located adjacent to Oak Street, 10th Street, and 11th Street in Oakland, Cali ...

, Oakland, CA * The

Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile, Los Angeles, California, Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Pa ...

, Los Angeles, CA * The

Minneapolis Institute of Art The Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia) is an arts museum located in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. Home to more than 90,000 works of art representing 5,000 years of world history, Mia is one of the largest art museums in the United State ...

, Minneapolis, MN * The

Cleveland Museum of Art The Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) is an art museum in Cleveland, Ohio, located in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on the city's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egyptian ...

, Cleveland, OH * The

DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park The deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum is a 30-acre sculpture park and contemporary art museum on the shore of Flint's Pond in Lincoln, Massachusetts, 20 miles northwest of Boston. It was established in 1950. It is the largest park of its kind ...

, Lincoln, MA * The

Detroit Institute of Art The Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA), located in Midtown Detroit, Michigan, has one of the largest and most significant art collections in the United States. With over 100 galleries, it covers with a major renovation and expansion project complete ...

, Detroit, MI * The

Indianapolis Museum of Art The Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA) is an encyclopedic art museum located at Newfields, a campus that also houses Lilly House, The Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park: 100 Acres, the Gardens at Newfields, the Beer Garden, and more. It i ...

, Indianapolis, IN * The

Portland Museum of Art The Portland Museum of Art, or PMA, is the largest and oldest public art institution in the U.S. state of Maine. Founded as the Portland Society of Art in 1882. It is located in the downtown area known as The Arts District in Portland, Maine. Hi ...

, Portland, ME

Solo exhibitions

* 2013 : ''39 Great Jones,''

Galerie Eva Presenhuber Galerie Eva Presenhuber is a contemporary art gallery, owned by Eva Presenhuber, with locations in Zurich, Switzerland (since 2003) and Vienna (since 2022). Eva Presenhuber founded Galerie Eva Presenhuber in October 2003 in Zurich, with an inaug ...

, 39 Great Jones Street Storefront, New York, NY * 2012 : Algus Greenspon, New York, NY * 2006 : Mitchell Algus Gallery, New York, NY * 2002 : Mitchell Algus Gallery, New York, NY * 1981 : Cranbrook Academy of Art Museum, Bloomfield, MI * 1976 : Gertrude Kasle Gallery, Detroit, MI * 1972 : Gimpel Weitzenhoffer Gallery, New York, NY * 1971 : Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN * 1970 : Cranbrook Academy of Art Museum, Bloomfield, MI * 1970 : Reed College, Portland, OR * 1967 : Renaissance Society, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL * 1967 : Howard Wise, New York, NY * 1967 : Princeton University Museum of Art, Princeton, NJ * 1966 : Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX * 1966 : Akron Art Institute, Akron, OH * 1966 : Portland Museum of Art, Portland, ME * 1966 : Milwaukee Art Center, Milwaukee, WI * 1966 : David Stuart Gallery, Los Angeles, CA * 1965 : Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN * 1964 : Cincinnati Museum of Art, Cincinnati, OH * 1964 : Howard Wise, New York, NY * 1964 : David Mirvish Gallery, Toronto, CA * 1962 : Howard Wise, New York, NY * 1961 : Swetzoff Gallery, Boston, MA * 1960 : Stable Gallery, Boston, MA * 1957 : Stable Gallery, New York, NY * 1955 : Wittenborn Gallery, New York, NY * 1953 : Tanager Gallery, New York, NY

Group exhibitions

* 2013 : ''39 Great Jones,''

, Zurich, CH * 1984 : ''New Acquisitions,'' Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH * 1981 : ''New Acquisitions,'' Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY * 1978 : Tenth Street Years, New York, NY * 1977 : ''The Spirit of Art,'' Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN * 1975 : ''Rainments of the Lord,'' Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL * 1972 : ''Whitney Biennial,'' Whitney Museum of Art, New York, NY * 1971 : ''Opening Exhibition,'' Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN * 1970 : ''Opening Exhibition,'' Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN * 1969 : ''Carnegie International,'' Pittsburgh, PA * 1968 : ''Icon-Idea,'' Rivington Arms, Lafayette College circulated by Smithsonian Institution, Easton, PA * 1967 : Carnegie International, Pittsburgh, PA * 1967 : ''Best of Season,'' Lany Aldrich Museum, Ridgefield, CT * 1967 : ''Tamarind Print Exhibition,'' Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY * 1965 : ''Tokyo Biennial,'' Tokyo, Japan * 1965 : ''A Decade of American Drawings,'' Whitney Museum, New York, NY * 1965 : ''Painting Annual,'' Whitney Museum, New York, NY * 1964 : ''Sculpture Annual,'' Whitney Museum, New York, NY * 1964 : ''American Painting,'' Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, NL * 1964 : ''History of Geometric Painting in America,'' Whitney Museum, New York, NY * 1964 : ''Carnegie International,'' Pittsburgh, PA * 1963 : ''Toward a New Abstraction,'' Jewish Museum, New York, NY * 1963 : ''The Formalists,'' Gallery of Modern Art, Washington D.C. * 1963 : ''60 Years of American Painting,'' Whitney Museum, New York, NY * 1962 : ''Annual,'' Chicago Art Institute, Chicago, IL * 1961 : ''American Sculpture,'' Claude Bernard Gallery, Paris, FR * 1960 : ''Artists Under 35,'' Whitney Museum, New York, NY * 1960 : ''New Acquisitions,'' Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY * 1959 : ''New Forms, New Media,'' Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, NY * 1958 : ''Stable Annual,'' Stable Gallery, New York, NY * 1950 : Salon de Mai, Paris, FR

Press

Morgan, Robert C., "George Ortman." ''The Brooklyn Rail,'' April 4, 2012.

Smith, Roberta, "George Ortman: Constructions: 1949 - 2011." ''The New York Times,'' February 23, 2012.

Long, Jim, "George Ortman." ''The Brooklyn Rail,'' December 2006.

Smith, Roberta, "George Ortman." ''The New York Times,'' December 8, 2006.

Glueck, Grace, "Art In Review; George Ortman -- 'The Models, an Imitation'." ''The New York Times,'' June 22, 2001.

Kunitz, Stanley, "George Ortman." ''The Art Museum Princeton University Press,'' November 1967.

O'Doherty, Brian, "Art: Constructions to Control Conditioned Reflexes." ''The New York Times,'' 1967.

Judd, Donald, "Specific Objects." ''Arts Yearbook,'' 1965.

Gruen, John, "Enigmas on Canvas." ''New York Herald Tribune,'' May 10, 1964.

O'Doherty, Brian, "Ortman." ''The New York Times,'' May 3, 1964.

"Second-Generation Abstraction." ''Time,'' May 24, 1963.

Burckhardt, Edith, "Exhibition at Stable." ''ArtNews,'' January 1960.

Ashton, Dore, "Art: On the Younger Side." ''The New York Times,'' January 6, 1960.

References

External links

Obituary on Artforum

* ttp://geoform.net/interviews/an-interview-with-artist-george-ortman/ Interview on Geoform, August 2010
George Earl Ortman in the National Gallery of Australia's Kenneth Tyler collection
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ortman, George Earl 1926 births 2015 deaths 20th-century American painters American male painters California College of the Arts alumni 20th-century American sculptors 20th-century American male artists 21st-century American painters 21st-century American male artists 21st-century American sculptors American male sculptors Artists from Oakland, California Painters from California Sculptors from California American people of German descent Cranbrook Academy of Art faculty Princeton University faculty People from Castine, Maine