The Washington Gallery of Modern Art was a short-lived gallery promoting

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic com ...

near

Dupont Circle Dupont Circle (or DuPont Circle) is a traffic circle, park, neighborhood and historic district in Northwest Washington, D.C. The Dupont Circle neighborhood is bounded approximately by 16th Street NW to the east, 22nd Street NW ...

Washington, DC ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan ...

, United States, during the 1960s. The gallery remained open for seven years, opening in October 1961 and closing in September 1968. Its collection of 153 works was purchased by the

Oklahoma City Museum of Art Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...

in 1968 for $110,000. The collection included 20th-century artists,

Ellsworth Kelly Ellsworth Kelly (May 31, 1923 – December 27, 2015) was an American painter, sculptor, and printmaker associated with hard-edge painting, Color Field painting and minimalism. His works demonstrate unassuming techniques emphasizing line, c ...

Robert Indiana Robert Indiana (born Robert Clark; September 13, 1928 – May 19, 2018) was an American artist associated with the pop art movement. His iconic image LOVE was first created in 1964 in the form of a card which he sent to several friends and acq ...

Grace Hartigan Grace Hartigan (March 28, 1922 – November 15, 2008) was an American Abstract Expressionist painter and a significant member of the vibrant New York School of the 1950s and 1960s. Her circle of friends, who frequently inspired one another in t ...

and

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 ...

History

The Washington Gallery of Modern Art had a number of exhibitions which traveled nationally and internationally, most notably the historic "Washington Color Painters" show in 1965, which formalized recognition of the

Washington Color School The Washington Color School, also known as the Washington, D.C., Color School, was an art movement starting during the 1950s–1970s in Washington, D.C., in the United States, built of abstract expressionist artists. The movement emerged during ...

of painters. Other important events at the Gallery included the first

Franz Kline Franz Kline (May 23, 1910 – May 13, 1962) was an American painter. He is associated with the Abstract Expressionist movement of the 1940s and 1950s. Kline, along with other action painters like Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Robert Mothe ...

retrospective in 1962, curated by Alice Denney, and the "Popular Image Show" in 1963, which included artists like

Robert Rauschenberg Milton Ernest "Robert" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combines (1954–1964), a group of artwor ...

Jasper Johns Jasper Johns (born May 15, 1930) is an American painter, sculptor, and printmaker whose work is associated with abstract expressionism, Neo-Dada, and pop art. He is well known for his depictions of the American flag and other US-related top ...

Tom Wesselmann Thomas K. Wesselmann (February 23, 1931 – December 17, 2004) was an American artist associated with the Pop Art movement who worked in painting, collage and sculpture. Early years Wesselmann was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Cincinnati. From 1949 ...

George Brecht George Brecht (August 27, 1926 – December 5, 2008), born George Ellis MacDiarmid, was an American conceptual artist and avant-garde composer, as well as a professional chemist who worked as a consultant for companies including Pfizer, Johnson ...

Claes Oldenburg Claes Oldenburg (January 28, 1929 – July 18, 2022) was a Swedish-born American sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring large replicas of everyday objects. Another theme in his work is soft sculpture versions ...

Jim Dine Jim Dine (born June 16, 1935 in Cincinnati, Ohio) is an American artist whose œuvre extends over sixty years. Dine’s work includes painting, drawing, printmaking (in many forms including lithographs, etchings, gravure, intaglio, woodcuts, l ...

and

James Rosenquist James Rosenquist (November 29, 1933 – March 31, 2017) was an American artist and one of the proponents of the pop art movement. Drawing from his background working in sign painting, Rosenquist's pieces often explored the role of advertising a ...

. The Gallery organized the raucous "Pop Festival" the same year, which was the first occasion on which Rauschenberg performed his now famous "Pelican."

John Cage John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading fi ...

and the Judson Dancers performed, Oldenburg staged a happening called "Stars," and

Robert Rosenblum Robert Rosenblum (July 24, 1927 – December 6, 2006) was an American art historian and curator known for his influential and often irreverent scholarship on European and American art of the mid-eighteenth to 20th centuries. Biography Rosenblum wa ...

delivered a lecture on Pop Art. The gallery was founded by Assistant Director, Alice Denney, and Julian Eisenstein. Among its directors were Gerald Nordland (who gave the Washington Color School its name),

Charles Millard Charles Hibbert (Charlie) Millard (August 25, 1896 – November 24, 1978) was a Canadian trade union activist and politician. Early life He was born in St. Thomas, Ontario, the son of a railroad repairman, and first trained as a carpenter. Mi ...

, Adelyn Breeskin and, for a short stint near the Gallery's end,

Walter Hopps Walter "Chico" Hopps (May 3, 1932 – March 20, 2005) was an American museum director, gallerist, and curator of contemporary art. Hopps helped bring Los Angeles post-war artists to prominence during the 1960s, and later went on to redefine pract ...

. Though a

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

article cites Eleanor "Lalli" Lloyd as the Gallery's founder, she was instead an important member of the first board.

References

External links

Oklahoma City Museum of Art
*[https://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost_historical/access/164544382.html?dids=164544382:164544382&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:AI&date=Oct+19%2C+1962&author=By+Kim+Willenson+Staff+Reporter&pub=The+Washington+Post%2C+Times+Herald++(1959-1973)&edition=&startpage=C2&desc=Franz+Kline+Art+Collection+Moves+In+And+Gallery+Plans+a+Housewarming 1962 Washington Post article announcing first Franz Kline retrospective at the Gallery]
Washington Gallery of Modern Art records, 1961-1989, (bulk 1961-1966)
{{Authority control 1968 disestablishments in Washington, D.C. Art galleries disestablished in 1968 Art museums and galleries in Washington, D.C. Defunct art museums and galleries in the United States Dupont Circle Art galleries established in 1961 1961 establishments in Washington, D.C.