Maxwell Harold Gimblett, (born 5 December 1935) is a

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

and American artist. His work, a harmonious postwar synthesis of American and Japanese art, brings together

abstract expressionism Abstract expressionism is a post–World War II art movement in American painting, developed in New York City in the 1940s. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve international influence and put New York at the center of the ...

, modernism, spiritual abstraction, and

Zen 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), and ...

calligraphy Calligraphy (from el, link=y, καλλιγραφία) is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instrument. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined as "t ...

. Gimblett’s work was included in the exhibition
The Third Mind: American Artists Contemplate Asia, 1869-1989
' at the Guggenheim Museum and is represented in that museum's collection as well as thee collections of the Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum of Art,

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, D.C.), San Francisco Museum of Modern Art,

Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is New Zealand's national museum and is located in Wellington. ''Te Papa Tongarewa'' translates literally to "container of treasures" or in full "container of treasured things and people that spring fr ...

, and the Auckland Art Gallery Toi O Tamaki, among others. Through out the year Gimblett leads sumi ink workshops all over the world. In 2006 he was appointed Inaugural Visiting Professor at the National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries,

Auckland University The University of Auckland is a public university, public research university based in Auckland, New Zealand. It is the largest, most comprehensive and highest-ranked university in New Zealand and consistently places among the top 100 universit ...

. Gimblett has received honorary doctorates from Waikato University and the Auckland University of Technology and was awarded the Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZM). He lives and works in New York and has returned to New Zealand over 65 times.

Life and work

Gimblett was born and raised in Grafton,

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

, New Zealand, a second-generation New Zealander. Gimblett attended King's School and

Auckland Grammar School Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The most populous urban area in the country and the fifth largest city in Oceania, Auckland has an urban population of about I ...

, and from 1951-1953 studied at and received his Associate in New Zealand Institute of Management from the Seddon Memorial College. Gimblett left New Zealand in 1956 to travel throughout Europe until 1961, with a brief return to Auckland for a year in 1958–59. Traveling to the Americas in 1962, Gimblett apprenticed with master potter Roman Bartkiw in Toronto, Canada, and then worked with master ceramist Merton Chambers from 1962 to 1964. In 1964 he married Barbara Kirshenblatt, now the Ronald S. Lauder Chief Curator of the Core Exhibition at

Polin Museum POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews ( pl, Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich) is a museum on the site of the former Warsaw Ghetto. The Hebrew language, Hebrew word ''Polin'' in the museum's English name means either "Poland" or "rest here" ...

of the History of Polish Jews and University Professor Emirita at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

. That same year he studied drawing at the Ontario College of Art, Toronto. It is in Toronto is here that Gimblett at Kirshenblatt were sitting together one night and Gimblett showed a conte crayon self portrait he had just completed to which Kirshenblatt declared, "you're a painter, Max!" and their fates were sealed. The pair began traveling the states in 1965 as Kirshenblatt attended various schools. They lived in San Francisco where Kirshenblatt studied at University of California, Berkeley and Gimblett briefly studied at the San Francisco Art Institute. He had his first one person exhibition with Richard Capper, San Francisco, in 1966. From 1967 to 1970 Gimblett had a studio in

Bloomington, Indiana Bloomington is a city in and the county seat of Monroe County, Indiana, Monroe County in the central region of the U.S. state of Indiana. It is the List of municipalities in Indiana, seventh-largest city in Indiana and the fourth-largest outside ...

where

Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett (born September 30, 1942, in Toronto, Ontario) is a scholar of Performance and Jewish Studies and a museum professional. Professor Emerita of Performance Studies at New York University, she is best known for her int ...

was completing her PhD in Folklore Studies. In 1970-1972 they lived in Austin, Texas, where Barbara was an associate professor in the English department at the

University of Texas The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

, Austin and Gimblett had an important one-person exhibition at Dave Hickey's legendary A Clean Well-Lighted Space. In 1972 Gimblett and Kirshenblatt moved to New York—a place they would call home for the rest of their lives. In 1974 Gimblett formed an affinity and enduring friendship with the experimental filmmaker and kinetic sculptor

Len Lye Leonard Charles Huia Lye (; 5 July 1901 – 15 May 1980) was a New Zealand artist known primarily for his experimental films and kinetic sculpture. His films are held in archives including the New Zealand Film Archive, British Film Institute, Mu ...

, a fellow New Zealander. Gimblett continued to support Lye's work after his death and in 1990 he became a trustee of the Len Lye Foundation based in New Plymouth, New Zealand. In 1979 Gimblett and Kirshenblatt became American

Citizens Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...

. In 1975 he joined the Cuningham Ward Gallery, New York where he exhibited with

Ross Bleckner Ross Bleckner (born May 12, 1949) is an American artist. He currently lives and works in New York City. His artistic focus is on painting, and he held his first solo exhibition in 1975. Some of his art work reflected on the AIDS epidemic. Earl ...

, John Walker,

David Reed David Reed may refer to: Entertainment * David Vern Reed (1924–1989), American comics writer * David E. Reed (1927–1990), ''Reader's Digest'' editor * David Reed (artist) (born 1946), American artist * David Jay Reed (born 1950), artist * Da ...

John Elderfield John Elderfield (born 25 April 1943) was Chief Curator of Painting and Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, from 2003 to 2008.''Who’s Who 2011'', A&C Black, 2011 He served as the Allen R. Adler, Class of 1967, Distinguished Curator a ...

, and Lynton Wells. In 1989 he was awarded the National Endowment for the Arts Painting Fellowship. In 1990 Gimblett joined the Haines Gallery, San Francisco and the Gow Langsford Gallery, Auckland. Both of these galleries continue to represent him today. In 1991 he participated in a residency at The Rockefeller Foundation, Study and Conference Center, Bellagio, Lake Como, Italy. Gimblett was a J. Paul Getty associate at the Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities, Santa Monica, in 1991–1992. Craig Potton Publishing published his first monograph in 2002 in association with Gow Langsford Gallery (Auckland), which includes essays by John Yau and Wystan Curnow. "Max Gimblett: The Brush of All Things", a major survey of his work, opened at the Auckland Art Gallery Toi O Tamaki, Auckland, New Zealand in 2004 and traveled to the City Gallery, Wellington. Thomas McEvilley and Wystan Curnow contributed essays to the catalog, which also contained an interview with Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett. "Here is how it happened. Gimblett stepped up to the 80-inch circular canvas and while that murderous train bore down on him, he painted The Wheel in less than one minute. This is no exaggeration, in on rapturous, fearless moment, which left him with time to spare." Wystan Curnow describes Gimblett painting The Wheel, an Enso, in his essay An Exhilaration of the Spirit, in Max Gimblett, monograph, 2002, published by Craig Potton Publishing in association with Gow Langsford Gallery, also including an essay by

John Yau John Yau (born June 5, 1950) is an American poet and critic who lives in New York City. He received his B.A. from Bard College in 1972 and his M.F.A. from Brooklyn College in 1978. He has published over 50 books of poetry, artists' books, fiction ...

. In January 2006 Max Gimblett took refuge in the precepts of Buddha, under the guidance of Dairyu Michael "Great Dragon" Wenger, at the San Francisco Zen Center. "Gimblett’s absorption in Asian art connects him to three unique figures in American art:

Morris Graves Morris Graves (August 28, 1910 – May 5, 2001) was an American painter. He was one of the earliest Modern artists from the Pacific Northwest to achieve national and international acclaim. His style, referred to by some reviewers as Mysticism, ...

John McLaughlin John or Jon McLaughlin may refer to: Arts and entertainment * John McLaughlin (musician) (born 1942), English jazz fusion guitarist, member of Mahavishnu Orchestra * Jon McLaughlin (musician) (born 1982), American singer-songwriter * John McLaug ...

, and

Ad Reinhardt Adolph Dietrich Friedrich Reinhardt (December 24, 1913 – August 30, 1967) was an abstract painter active in New York for more than three decades. He was a member of the American Abstract Artists (AAA) and part of the movement center ...

," writes Yau, "One reason Gimblett shares a deep connection with these three seminal figures is because all of them embarked upon an intense and prolonged study of different schools of Buddhism and Buddhist art." He was appointed to the honorary position of Visiting Professor of Art to the National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries, Auckland University, Auckland, New Zealand in 2003. Gimblett was the Laila Foundation Artist in Residence at HuiPress, Maui, HI in July 2008, making a suite of Enso etchings. His work was included in the Guggenheim Museum's exhibition titled "The Third Mind: American Artists Contemplate Asia, 1860 to 1989" which was open from 30 January to 19 April 2009. The exhibition was curated by Alexandra Munroe, the museum's first Senior Curator of Asian Art. For ANZAC's 100th Anniversary, he created the "Art of Remembrance" public art—solid brass quatrefoils to represent each Kiwi soldier that served in WW1, placed in a grid, as if armor, on the exterior of St. David's Church on Khyber Pass Road in Auckland, Gimblett's childhood church . The sales of individual Art of Remembrance quatrefoils raised enough capital to save the church. Versions of "Art of Remembrance" have been installed at Te Papa and The Auckland War Memorial Museum (where "Tower of Remembrance" it is a part of the collection and on permanent display). He was named an

Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit The New Zealand Order of Merit is an order of merit in the New Zealand royal honours system. It was established by royal warrant on 30 May 1996 by Elizabeth II, Queen of New Zealand, "for those persons who in any field of endeavour, have rend ...

for services to art in the 2015 Queen's Birthday Honours. On 26 October 2017, Gimblett received an honorary doctorate from the University of Waikato and again in 20for his philanthropy and achievements in the artistic world. In 2022 The Getty Research Institute acquired an archive of more than 250 artist’s books as The Max Gimblett Artist's Book Collection. Gimblett's work is rich and inventive. He is known for his great technical and stylistic range: the monochrome, geometric abstraction, the calligraphic and figurative expressionism all find a place in the work. He uses novel shaped supports: ovals, circles, and rings. However the quatrefoil is the shape he has really made his own. "The quatrefoil is defined ..." writes Thomas McEvilley, "as 'a compound leaf or flower consisting of four (usually rounded) leaflets or petals radiating from a common center.' Most of Gimblett’s works in this format are geometrised, meaning that the petals of the flowers are not merely rounded in an organic sense but are composed of four perfect circles that intersect at a single point. It is a format which virtually no other modern artist has emphasized." Gimblett's work is highly affected by

Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gra ...

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...

, classical mythology, alchemy, the writing of Carl Jung, Ernest Hemingway, William Saroyan, DH Lawrence, Dostoyevsky, and the poetry of TS Eliot,

Charles Brasch Charles Orwell Brasch (27 July 1909 – 20 May 1973) was a New Zealand poet, literary editor and arts patron. He was the founding editor of the literary journal ''Landfall'', and through his 20 years of editing the journal, had a significant im ...

, and Robert Creeley. He's influenced by fellow artists Len Lye, Jackson Pollock, William Turner, Henri Matisse, and Elizabeth Murray, and Zen ink painters Sengai Gibon, Yamaoka Tesshū, and Hakuin Ekaku. "The Influence of Zen," writes Thomas McEvilley, "for example, seems natural to Gimblett, and carries with it an echo of Asia’s proximity to New Zealand, but also can be traced partly to American artists with West Coast connections such as Clyfford Still and Mark Tobey. Gimblett has made a harmonious post-war synthesis of America and Japan."McEvilley, Thomas. The Brush of All Things, The Transition from Three to Four, Auckland Art Gallery, Toi o Tamaki, Auckland, New Zealand. Page 9. Gimblett has collaborated with a number of other artists including Robert Creeley (The Dogs of Auckland),

Lewis Hyde Lewis Hyde (born 1945) is a scholar, essayist, translator, cultural critic and writer whose scholarly work focuses on the nature of imagination, creativity, and property. Profile Hyde was born in Cambridge, MA. He is the son of Elizabeth Sanfor ...

(Oxherding, numerous works on paper, paintings, and artist books),

(artist books, works on paper, paintings), Alan Loney (Mondrian's Flowers),

Chris Martin Christopher Anthony John Martin (born 2 March 1977) is an English singer-songwriter and musician. He is best known as the lead vocalist, pianist, rhythm guitarist and co-founder of the rock band Coldplay. Born in Exeter, Devon, he went to Univ ...

(works on paper), Michael Dai Ryu Wenger "Great Dragon" (works on paper, artist books), Matt Jones (works on paper, artist books paintings), Philip Luxton (ceramics), Giovanni Forlino (works on paper, artist books), Kristen Reyes (works on paper, artist books) and Perry Kirker-Mraz (works on paper, artist books, paintings).

Life and work

References

External links