Gregory Gillespie

Infobox Artist
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name = Gregory Gillespie


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birthdate = 1936
location = Roselle Park, New Jersey
deathdate = 2000
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nationality = American
field = Painting
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Gregory Gillespie (November 29, 1936 – April 26, 2000) was an American magic realist painter.

He was born in Roselle Park, New Jersey. After graduating from high school, he became a nondegree student at Cooper Union in New York. In 1959 he married Frances Cohen (1939 – 1998), who was also an artist, and the following year they moved to San Francisco where Gillespie studied at the San Francisco Art Institute.

In 1962 he received the first of two Fulbright-Hays grants, for travel to Italy to study the work of Masaccio. He lived and worked in Florence for two years, and in Rome for six years, studying the works of such Renaissance masters as Carpaccio, Mantegna, and Carlo Crivelli, who was a particular favorite of Gillespie. [Lerner, 1977, p. 22] During this time he was awarded three Chester Dale Fellowships and a Louis Comfort Tiffany grant, and in 1966 he had his first solo show, at the Forum Gallery in New York. He returned to the United States in 1970.

He exhibited in several Whitney Biennials, and in 1977 the Hirshhorn Museum organized a touring retrospective of his work. The Hirshhorn Museum has at least fourteen works by Gillespie in its collection (see external links). According to Askart.com [http://www.askart.com/AskART/artists/search/Search_Grid.aspx?searchtype=MUSEUMS&artist=16793] , Gillespie's work is also in the collections of the Whitney Museum, the Arkansas Arts Center, and the Butler Institute of American Art, among others.

Gillespie became known for meticulously painted figurative paintings, landscapes, and self portraits, often with a fantastical element. Many of his early works were made by painting over photographs cut from newspapers or magazines, transforming the scenes through photographic collage and by adding imaginary elements. He often combined media in an unorthodox way to create shrine-like assemblages.

He was found dead in his studio in Belchertown, Massachusetts, apparently a suicide by hanging, on April 26, 2000.

Notes

References

*Lerner, Abram (1977). "Gregory Gillespie". Washington: [Published for the] Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, by Smithsonian Institution Press. OCLC|3397187

External links

* [http://www.askart.com/askart/artist.aspx?artist=16793 Askart.com's main page on Gillespie] , with color image
* [http://www.aacwebkiosk.com/Art2503$703 Arkansas Arts Center:] page with bio and information on two works by Gillespie in the Arkansas Arts Center's collection; with access to two color images
* [http://hirshhorn.si.edu/collection/search.asp?Artist=gillespie&Title=&Date=&Nationality=American&School= Hirshhorn Museum] : page with information on fourteen works by Gillespie in the museum's collection, including several color images
* [http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/gillespie_gregory.html Artcyclopedia on Gregory Gillespie] , with links to color images of works by Gillespie in various museums, including the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum