The Parrish Art Museum introduces a new exhibition series, Parrish Perspectives, focused on new ways of thinking about art, artists, and the creative process. The first presentation of Parrish Perspectives, on view from March 15 through April 26, 2015, features three focused, timely exhibitions of artists with close ties to the East End of Long Island: Robert Dash: Theme and Variations; Jules Feiffer: Kill My Mother; and Joe Zucker: Life & Times of an Orb Weaver.

Parrish Art Museum Director Terrie Sultan explains, “While the Parrish special exhibition schedule is planned years in advance, Parrish Perspectives allows the Museum to curate exhibitions with a sense of spontaneity and immediacy. Kill My Mother was just published at the end of 2014; Life & Times of an Orb Weaver features recent acquisitions, augmented by newly discovered works by Zucker; and the untimely loss of Robert Dash is recognized by an in-depth look at his process through the lens of his final series of paintings.”

Robert Dash (American, 1934–2013). Sagg Main, 2007. Oil on canvas. Collection of The Madoo Conservancy

Robert Dash: Theme and Variations presents eleven paintings and eight works on paper created by the artist, who painted and gardened at Madoo (an old Scottish word for “my dove”), a gray-shingled cluster of 18th-century buildings near the ocean in Sagaponack, for nearly 50 years. The paintings, titled Sagg Main, 2007, as well as the drawings were inspired by Dash’s 1972 lithograph of neighboring Sagg Main Street. Dash amplified that image first by creating drawings that began with gesso applied to the lithographs, further developing the concept through a series of paintings—nuanced exploration of color and light. These works on view, including the original lithograph, illuminate a process that began more than 30 years ago.

Jules Feiffer (American, born 1929). From Kill My Mother, by Jules Feiffer (Liveright Publishing Corporation). Courtesy of the artist.

Jules Feiffer: The original large-scale ink and ink wash on paper drawings for Kill My Mother (Liveright Publishing, 2014) reveal how Feiffer, at the age of 85, has developed a new direction, combining a series of complex and nuanced drawings with an ear for classic noir storytelling. For the exhibition at the Parrish, Feiffer has created a series of new drawings (Jules Feiffer, Mother, 2014) that provide viewers with brief summaries of the narrative action depicted in the works on view. In this new work, Feiffer transitioned from the sketchy line drawings that defined his style—most notably, in the long running Village Voice comic Feiffer—to a specific cinematic style, rife with kinetic illustrations, stark contrasts of light and shadow, and atmospheric elements like rainy streets, reflected light in the dark of night, and dense, intricate backgrounds. Sultan adds, “These original working drawings show a great deal of detail and technique, providing viewers with a real sense of the artist’s hand, and offer a rare look at Feiffer’s creative process.”

Joe Zucker (American, born 1941).  Spider, 1991; Acrylic on Japanese rice paper
Parrish Art Museum, Water Mill, New York, Gift of Julia Childs Augur, 2014.10.6

Joe Zucker: Nine drawings by Joe Zucker, a gift to the Parrish from Julia Childs Auger, prompted an in-depth look at a specific study by this versatile artist in Life & Times of an Orb Weaver. The exhibition, featuring works inspired by the artist’s extended consideration of the spider, comprises paintings, prints, and 20 drawings—studies for Zucker’s 1992 print project with Riverhouse Editions in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. The drawings include the recently discovered sketches and plans that are heavily annotated with the artist’s inventive, humorous stratagems for his spider chronicles, as well as acrylic and Rhoplex drawings shown for the first time with the 36 x 36-inch prints. Zucker’s work is rooted in the relationship of the image with process and materials, an approach that is exemplified in the paintings—sash-cord and Rhoplex strung in a lattice-like grid, alluding to a spider’s web. Zucker says, “The work touches on the issues of the relationship between the process of painting and the meaning and use of the materials.”

More About the Artists:
Robert Dash (1934–2013), born in New York City, became interested in the Abstract Expressionists as a student of ethnology and literature at the University of New Mexico. Upon graduation, he moved to New York where he worked as an editor and art critic, and, with no formal training, began painting. His first solo exhibition was at the Kornblee Gallery in 1960. In 1967, Dash purchased the property in Sagaponack New York, where he painted, designed elaborate gardens, and wrote poetry as well as a bimonthly column, “Notes from Madoo,” for an East Hampton weekly newspaper. Dash’s paintings are in collections nationwide, including the Parrish Art Museum; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C.

Jules Feiffer, born in 1929 and raised in the Bronx worked as an assistant to cartoonist Will Eisner, writing dialogue for The Spirit.  Feiffer’s Village Voice cartoon strip brought him to prominence as a social and political satirist, and earned him the Pulitzer Prize for political cartoons. He is author/illustrator of numerous children’s books as well as compilations of cartoons and strips, and has written novels, an autobiography, and award-winning stage plays, and screenplays. Feiffer was inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame and earned the Writers Guild of America Lifetime Achievements Award, and the National Cartoonists Society’s Milton Caniff Lifetime Achievement Award, and a George Polk Award for his cartoons. He lives in East Hampton, New York, and is a visiting professor in the MFA in Creative Writing and Literature program at Stony Brook Southampton.

Joe Zucker was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, and received a B.F.A. (1964) and an M.F.A (1966) from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Zucker moved to New York in 1968 to teach at the School of Visual Arts, and his work was first exhibited at the Bykert Gallery in New York. Over a wide-ranging career, Zucker has been consistently recognized as one of America’s most inventive artists. His style is deeply rooted in his process, and the imagery he uses originates in the physical properties of the materials chosen for each project. This visual strategy has served Zucker throughout four decades, allowing for diversity in his work that defies categorization. Solo museum exhibitions include the Whitney Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, as well as numerous gallery shows in New York (including Mary Boone, Leo Castelli, Nolan/Eckman, and Paul Kasmin) and in venues worldwide.

Related Programs
Friday, March 20, 6pm
Jules Feiffer Conversation and Book Signing
Parrish Art Museum Director Terrie Sultan in conversation with Jules Feiffer, who will sign copies of Kill My Mother. (Liveright Publishing, 2014)

Friday, April 3, 6pm
The Artist’s View: Joe Zucker
Joe Zucker and Alicia Longwell, the Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Chief Curator, Art and Education, lead a guided tour of Joe Zucker: Life & Times of An Orb Weaver.

Saturday, April 11, 11am
Robert Dash: Theme & Variations—A Roundtable Discussion
A conversation among associates of Dash, led by Alicia Longwell, the Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Chief Curator, Art and Education.

Robert Dash: Theme & Variations is made possible, in part, by the generous support of The Alec Baldwin Foundation. Jules Feiffer: Kill My Mother is made possible, in part, by the generous support of The Maurice Sendak Foundation, Jean Albano Broday/Jean Albano Gallery Chicago, Louise Kerz Hirschfeld, Stephen and Mina Weiner, and an anonymous donor. Joe Zucker: Life &Times of an Orb Weaver is made possible, in part, by the generous support of the Mary Boone Gallery.

Images (L to R):
Robert Dash (American, 1934–2013) Sagg Main, 2007, Oil on canvas, 70 x 60 in. Collection of the Madoo Conservancy. Photo: Gary Mamay; Jules Feiffer (American, born 1929) From Kill My Mother, by Jules Feiffer (Liveright Publishing Corporation). 20 x 15 in. Courtesy of the artist; Joe Zucker (American, born 1941), Spider, 1991, Acrylic and Rhoplex on Japanese rice paper, 24 x 18 in.
Parrish Art Museum, Water Mill, New York, Gift of Julia Childs Augur. Photo: Gary Mamay.