John Millard Ferren (October 17, 1905 – July 1, 1970) was an
American artist and educator. He was active from 1920 until 1970 in San Francisco, Paris and New York City.
Early life
John Ferren was born in
Pendleton, Oregon
Pendleton is a city and the county seat of Umatilla County, Oregon. The population was 17,107 at the time of the 2020 census, which includes approximately 1,600 people who are incarcerated at Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution.
Pendleton ...
on October 17, 1905, on the
Blackfoot Indian Reservation.
His parents were Verna Zay (née Westfall) and James William Ferren, his father served in the Army and the family moved often.
In 1911, the family settled down in San Francisco, California.
In 1925, he briefly attended the California School of Fine Arts (now known as
San Francisco Art Institute).
In his 20s, he apprenticed as a
stonecutter in San Francisco
and producing
portrait busts.
Career
Paris
In 1929, he traveled to New York City and Paris.
While in Paris, Ferren attended classes at the
Sorbonne
Sorbonne may refer to:
* Sorbonne (building), historic building in Paris, which housed the University of Paris and is now shared among multiple universities.
*the University of Paris (c. 1150 – 1970)
*one of its components or linked institution, ...
,
Académie de la Grande Chaumière
The Académie de la Grande Chaumière is an art school in the Montparnasse district of Paris, France.
History
The school was founded in 1904 by the Catalan painter Claudio Castelucho on the rue de la Grande Chaumière in Paris, near the Acad ...
, and
Académie Ranson.
Although for the most part not formally educated, preferring to develop his art through an adventurous life style, and interaction with other artists, he was known as an intellectual among his peers. He wrote many published articles on abstract art and art theory. His writing and artwork appears in three issues of the influential magazine;
''It is. A Magazine for Abstract Art'' (1958-1965). While in Paris, Ferren was part of the community of artists working in Europe in the 1920s and 30s, including
Marcel Duchamp
Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...
,
Max Ernst
Max Ernst (2 April 1891 – 1 April 1976) was a German (naturalised American in 1948 and French in 1958) painter, sculptor, printmaker, graphic artist, and poet. A prolific artist, Ernst was a primary pioneer of the Dada movement and Surrealis ...
,
Hans Hofmann,
Joaquín Torres-García
Joaquín Torres García (28 July 1874 – 8 August 1949) was a Uruguayan-Spanish artist who was born in Montevideo, Uruguay. Torres-García emigrated to Catalunya, Spain as an adolescent, where he began his career as an artist in 1891. For ...
,
Alberto Giacometti,
Henri Matisse
Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a drawing, draughtsman, printmaking, printmaker, and sculptur ...
,
Joan Miró,
Piet Mondrian, and
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...
.
He became friendly with Picasso, who mentored him, and together they stretched the canvas for Picasso's large 1937 painting ''
Guernica
Guernica (, ), official name (reflecting the Basque language) Gernika (), is a town in the province of Biscay, in the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country, Spain. The town of Guernica is one part (along with neighbouring Lumo) of the mu ...
''.
He briefly returned to the United States in 1930, returning to Paris soon after, where he remained until 1938.
He was liked to the group
Abstraction-Création.
He was the only artist who was both an inner-circle member of the Parisian avant garde of the 1930s, and the
New York School abstract expressionists of the 1940s and 1950s.
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein (February 3, 1874 – July 27, 1946) was an American novelist, poet, playwright, and art collector. Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the Allegheny West neighborhood and raised in Oakland, California, Stein moved to Paris ...
, remarked of Ferren in her 1937 book ''
Everybody's Autobiography'': "He is the only American painter foreign painters in Paris consider a painter and whose painting interests them.
He worked at
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 t ...
with
Stanley William Hayter, and learned about a nineteenth-century printing technique, the engraving plate is imprinted in wet plaster, and when dried, is then carved and painted.
New York
In 1938, he moved to New York City. He was a founding member (and later president) of
''The Club'', a group of artists who were at the heart of the emerging ''
New York School'' of
abstract expressionism. He befriended
Yun Gee, and through Gee, he became interested
Taoism
Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Ta ...
and
Zen Buddhism
Zen ( zh, t=禪, p=Chán; ja, text= 禅, translit=zen; ko, text=선, translit=Seon; vi, text=Thiền) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty, known as the Chan School (''Chánzong'' 禪宗), an ...
.
He taught at the
Brooklyn Museum Art School
The Brooklyn Museum Art School was a non-degree-granting professional school that opened at the Brooklyn Museum in Brooklyn, New York in the summer of 1941. The Brooklyn Museum Art School provided instruction for amateur artists as well until Janua ...
, starting in 1946.
Additionally he taught at
Cooper Union (1946),
Queens College (1952–1970),
ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena, California, and the
University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California S ...
.
During this time, he lived in a home and summer studio he designed and built in Brentwood, California.
In the 1950s, Ferren collaborated with
Alfred Hitchcock. In the 1955 film ''
The Trouble With Harry'', the artworks of main character Sam Marlowe were painted by Ferren. In the 1958 film ''
Vertigo
Vertigo is a condition where a person has the sensation of movement or of surrounding objects moving when they are not. Often it feels like a spinning or swaying movement. This may be associated with nausea, vomiting, sweating, or difficulties w ...
'', Ferren created the
Jimmy Stewart
James Maitland Stewart (May 20, 1908 – July 2, 1997) was an American actor and military pilot. Known for his distinctive drawl and everyman screen persona, Stewart's film career spanned 80 films from 1935 to 1991. With the strong morality h ...
nightmare sequence as well as the haunting, ''Portrait of Carlotta''.
Beirut
Ferren was selected as the first US State Department's Artist in Residence, and spent one year ('63–'64) residing in Beirut, Lebanon with his family. They lived on the second floor of the famous Beirut landmark building
The Pink House (sometimes Rose House) which also served as his studio. While lin the middle east he had several exhibitions, including at the American University of Beirut, and travel throughout the region giving lectures on his work, and American Abstract Expressionism. His presence there was captured in an art project by painter Tom Young, in 2014–2015.
East Hampton
Ferren, along with friend and fellow painter Willem de Kooning, purchased adjacent land and a house, to which he added a studio, from sculptor Wilfred Zogbaum in 1959. A few years after returning from Beirut, the Ferren's moved from New York City to live and paint full-time in East Hampton, however he also maintained a studio in New York at 147 Spring Street (sharing the building with Robert Wilson's ''Byrd Hoffman School of Byrds''), as he was simultaneously a professor teaching color and painting, and serving as chairman of the art department for
CUNY, Queens College. This was a very prolific period for them both, and the Ferren's remained active members of the East Hampton artist community, for the remainder of their lives. Both of their works can be seen as prominent parts of the Guild Hall Museum permanent collection
7 and on exhibit at the Smithsonian American Art Museum permanent collection, along with their son's Bran Ferren.
Personal life
His first marriage was in 1932 to Laure Ferren (née Ortiz de Zarate), the daughter of
Manuel Ortiz de Zarate, and ended in divorce by 1938.
His second marriage was in 1941, to Inez Ferren (née Chatfield), and ended in divorce by 1948.
While teaching at Brooklyn Museum Art School, he met Rae Tonkel, one of his students and an Impressionist painter.
Ferren married Rae Ferren (née Tonkel) in 1949, when she was age 20 and he was age 44.
Rae Ferren died on September 6, 2016.
Their son,
Bran Ferren
Bran Ferren (born January 16, 1953), is an American technologist, artist, architectural designer, vehicle designer, engineer, lighting and sound designer, visual effects artist, scientist, lecturer, photographer, entrepreneur, and inventor. Ferr ...
, is a noted designer, technologist, inventor, and businessman.
Death
Ferren died of cancer at the
Southampton Hospital
Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, centrally located in the Village of Southampton, New York, is a 125-bed hospital accredited by the Joint Commission. A location of Stony Brook Medicine, Stony Brook Southampton Hospital is a New York State-desig ...
in
Southampton
Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...
, New York in 1970.
He is buried at
Green River Cemetery
Green River Cemetery is a cemetery in the hamlet of Springs, New York within the Town of East Hampton.
The cemetery was originally intended for the blue collar local families (called Bonackers) of the Springs neighborhood who supported the oce ...
in East Hampton, New York.
Museum permanent collections
His work is in various public museum collections including:
*
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC
*
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, New York
*
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 th ...
, New York City, New York
*
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California
*
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, New York
*
Peggy Guggenheim Collection
The Peggy Guggenheim Collection is an art museum on the Grand Canal in the Dorsoduro ''sestiere'' of Venice, Italy. It is one of the most visited attractions in Venice. The collection is housed in the , an 18th-century palace, which was the home ...
in Venice, Italy
*
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, California
*
The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia
*
The Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, Michigan
*
Oklahoma City Museum of Art
Oklahoma (; Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a state in the South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the north, Missouri on the northeast, Arkansas on the east, New M ...
, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
*
Sheldon Museum of Art
The Sheldon Museum of Art is an art museum in the city of Lincoln, in the state of Nebraska in the Midwestern United States. Its collection focuses on 19th- and 20th-century art.
History
Sheldon Art Association
In 1888, The Sheldon Art Assoc ...
, Lincoln, Nebraska
*
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 ...
, Indianapolis, Indiana
*
The Newberry Library
The Newberry Library is an independent research library, specializing in the humanities and located on Washington Square in Chicago, Illinois. It has been free and open to the public since 1887. Its collections encompass a variety of topics rela ...
, Chicago, Illinois
*
Guild Hall of East Hampton, East Hampton, New York
*
The Hirschhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden
*
Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts
Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch language, Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appa ...
, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
*
The Phillips Collection
The Phillips Collection is an art museum founded by Duncan Phillips (art collector), Duncan Phillips and Marjorie Acker Phillips in 1921 as the Phillips Memorial Gallery located in the Dupont Circle neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Phillips was the ...
, Washington DC
*
Blanton Museum of Art
The Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art (often referred to as the Blanton or the BMA) at the University of Texas at Austin is one of the largest university art museums in the U.S. with 189,340 square feet devoted to temporary exhibitions, permanent col ...
, Austin, Texas
* Davidson Art Center,
Wesleyan University
Wesleyan University ( ) is a private liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded in 1831 as a men's college under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal Church and with the support of prominent residents of Middletown, the col ...
, Middletown, Connecticut
*
Parrish Art Museum
The Parrish Art Museum is an art museum designed by Herzog & de Meuron Architects and located in Water Mill, New York, whereto it moved in 2012 from Southampton Village. The museum focuses extensively on work by artists from the artist colony o ...
,
Water Mill, New York
Water Mill is a hamlet and a census-designated place (CDP) within the Town of Southampton on Long Island in Suffolk County, New York, United States. The population of the CDP was 1,559 at the 2010 census. Its ZIP Code is 11976.
As of 2010, Wate ...
*
Amon Carter Museum of American Art
Amon may refer to:
Mythology
* Amun, an Ancient Egyptian deity, also known as Amon and Amon-Ra
* Aamon, a Goetic demon
People Momonym
* Amon of Judah ( 664– 640 BC), king of Judah
Given name
* Amon G. Carter (1879–1955), American pu ...
, Fort Worth, Texas
*
John Raimondi
John Raimondi (born May, 1948) is an American sculptor best known as a creator of monumental public sculpture, with works throughout the United States and several European countries. He lives and works in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
Biography
...
Collection
*
Newark Art Museum, Newark, New Jersey
*
Neuberger Museum of Art
Neuberger Museum of Art is located in Purchase, New York, United States. It is affiliated with Purchase College, part of the State University of New York system. It is the nation's tenth-largest university museum. The museum is one of 14 sites o ...
, Purchase, New York
*
The National Gallery of Art
*
The Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, San Francisco, California
*
Weatherspoon Art Museum
The Weatherspoon Art Museum is located at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and is one of the largest collections of modern and contemporary art in the southeast with a focus on American art. Its programming includes fifteen or more ...
*
Albright-Knox Art Gallery
The Buffalo AKG Art Museum, formerly known as the Albright–Knox Art Gallery, is an art museum at 1285 Elmwood Avenue, Buffalo, New York, in Delaware Park. the museum's Elmwood Avenue campus is temporarily closed for construction. It hosted e ...
, Buffalo, New York
*
US Embassy, Paris, France
*
Santa Barbara Museum of Art
*
Islip Art Museum,
Islip
Islip may refer to:
Places England
* Islip, Northamptonshire
*Islip, Oxfordshire
United States
*Islip, New York, a town in Suffolk County
** Islip (hamlet), New York, located in the above town
**Central Islip, New York, a hamlet and census-d ...
, New York
*
Lowe Art Museum
Lowe Art Museum is the art museum of the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida. The museum is located on the campus of the University of Miami and is accessible by Miami Metrorail at University Station.
Lowe Art Museum's comprehensive co ...
, Miami, Florida
*
Yale University Art Gallery
The Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG) is the oldest university art museum in the Western Hemisphere. It houses a major encyclopedic collection of art in several interconnected buildings on the campus of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. ...
, New Haven, Connecticut
Exhibitions
A list of select exhibitions by John Ferren.
* 1923-1930 – San Francisco Art Association, San Francisco, California
*1932 – Los Angeles Art Association, San Francisco, California
*1932 – Galerie Zak, Paris, France
* 1936 – Galerie Pierre, Paris, France
* 1936 –
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern and contemporary art museum located in San Francisco, California. A nonprofit organization, SFMOMA holds an internationally recognized collection of modern and contemporary art, and wa ...
, San Francisco, California
* 1936 –
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, Minnesota
* 1936–1938 –
Pierre Matisse Gallery
Pierre Matisse (June 13, 1900 – August 10, 1989) was a French-American art dealer active in New York City. He was the youngest child of French painter Henri Matisse.
Background and early years
Pierre Matisse was born in Bohain-en-Vermandois on J ...
, New York City, New York
* 1937 –
Arts Club of Chicago
Arts Club of Chicago is a private club and public exhibition space located in the Near North Side community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States, a block east of the Magnificent Mile, that exhibits international contemporar ...
, Chicago Illinois
*1939 – Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Pennsylvania
* 1940 – Pierre Loeb Galerie, Paris, France (3 shows)
* 1940 –
The Corcoran Gallery, Washington, D.C.
*1941 – Corcoran Gallery, Washington D.C.
* 1942 – Peggy Guggenheim's
Art of This Century Gallery, New York City, New York
*1946 – Detroit Institute of Art, Maryland
*1947 – Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois
* 1947–1949 – Kleeman Gallery, New York City, New York
*1950 –
Museum of New Mexico The Museum of New Mexico is a collection of museums, historic sites, and archaeological services governed by the State of New Mexico. It currently consists of six divisions : the Palace of the Governors state history museum, the New Mexico Museum o ...
, New Mexico
* 1951 –
9th Street Art Exhibition
The 9th Street Art Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture is the official title artist Franz Kline hand-lettered onto the poster he designed for the Ninth Street Show (May 21-June 10, 1951). , New York City, New York
*1951 – Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, New York
* 1952 –
Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, California
*1953 – Iolas Gallery, New York
* 1954–1958 –
The Stable Gallery, New York City, New York (5 shows)
* 1955 –
Norton Simon Museum
The Norton Simon Museum is an art museum located in Pasadena, California, United States. It was previously known as the Pasadena Art Institute and the Pasadena Art Museum and displays numerous sculptures on its grounds.
Overview
The Norton Si ...
, Pasadena, California
*1955 – Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, New York
*1956 – Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, New York
* 1956 –
The Stable Gallery, New York
*1957 –
Arts Club of Chicago
Arts Club of Chicago is a private club and public exhibition space located in the Near North Side community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States, a block east of the Magnificent Mile, that exhibits international contemporar ...
, Chicago Illinois
*1957 – The Stable Gallery, New York
*1958 – Provincetown Art Festival, Massachusetts
* 1961 – Abstract Expressionists and Imagists, Guggenheim Museum, New York City, New York
* 1964 –
Post-painterly abstraction, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles, California
*1964-1966 – Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Pennsylvania
* 1965 –
Post-painterly abstraction, Walker Art Center
*1965 – Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, New York
*1965 – American Embassy Gallery, London
* 1967 –
Allentown Art Museum
The Allentown Art Museum of the Lehigh Valley is an art museum located in Allentown, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1934 by a group organized by noted Pennsylvania impressionist painter, Walter Emerson Baum. With its collection of over 19,000 ...
, Allentown, Pennsylvania
* 1968 – Kornblee Gallery, New York City, New York
* 1969–1985 – A.M. Sachs Gallery, New York City, New York (11 solo shows)
* 1962–1969 – Roses Fried Gallery, New York City, New York (7 shows)
* 1979 – Graduate Center,
City University of New York, New York City, New York
* 1985–2007 –
Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery
The Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery is an art gallery in New York City that was involved in the New York art market of the 1980s and 1990s.
The gallery was founded by Katharina Rich Perlow on New York's Upper East Side in 1985, moved to SoHo in ...
, New York City, New York (15 shows)
*1986 – Hofstra University Museum of Art, Hempstead, New York
* 1993 – Parish Art Museum, Southampton, New York
* 1993 –
State University of New York, Stonybrook, New York
* 1993 – Pollak-Krasner Study House, East Hampton, New York
*1993 – Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas
*1996 – Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles, California
* 1998 – Rose Fried Gallery, New York City, New York
*1998 – Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York City, New York
* 2008 – Hollis Taggart Gallery, New York City, New York
* 2009 – Spanierman Modern Gallery, New York City, New York
*2010-2011 –
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, NY
* 2013 –
The Baker Museum
The Baker Museum (formerly the Naples Museum of Art) is part of Artis–Naples, a multidisciplinary organization that also is the home of the Naples Philharmonic, located at 5833 Pelican Bay Boulevard, Naples, Florida. The museum, opened in 2000, h ...
, Naples, Florida
* 2015 –
David Findlay Jr. Gallery, New York, New York
* 2017 – Eric Firestone Gallery, East Hampton, New York
*2017 – Peyton Wright Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico
*2021 – David Findlay Jr. Gallery, New York, New York
References
External links
Guggenheim Museum - John Ferren
John Ferren on ArtnetSmithsonian American Art Museum - John Ferren
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ferren, John
1905 births
1970 deaths
Abstract painters
Artists from Los Angeles
People from Pendleton, Oregon
Burials at Green River Cemetery
Brooklyn Museum Art School faculty
Cooper Union faculty
American expatriates in France