Rackstraw Downes
Exhibition Dates: January 24 – March 1, 2008
Gallery Hours: Tuesday – Saturday, 10 am to 6 pm
Opening: Thursday, January 24, 2008, 6 – 8 PM
On Thursday, January 24, 2008, Betty Cuningham Gallery will open an exhibition of paintings by Rackstraw Downes comprised of approximately 20 works completed by Downes from 2004 to 2007.
Included is an important series of four paintings titled: Presidio Horse Racing Association Track, Presidio, Texas, painted on site during the last three winters. Downes, who moves with the seasons in order to paint on site year round, has been traveling to Texas since the early 1990’s. Concerning the locations that he chooses, Downes has said:
“It’s my job to find places that answer to some internal need—I think there is one before you even get to the place, and the place answers the need.”
Rackstraw Downes’s mesmerizing urban landscapes of New York have been acquired and displayed for years by the city’s most influential museums. Yet the painter is decidedly in no rush to meet connoisseurs’ demands. Mr. Downes is celebrated, in fact, for never being in a rush. He takes an entire summer to complete a single oil painting of a street scene, working meticulously from first to final stroke. He paints seven days a week, weather permitting, to get at the plein-air truth of the city’s grit and glory.
Rackstraw Downes work is featured on the cover.
The University of California, Davis, is honoring Betty Jean and Wayne Thiebaud by naming a new lecture series for them. The first lecture will be delivered by artist Rackstraw Downes, a MacArthur Foundation fellow, in May.
Rackstraw Downes Nature and Art are Physical: A Reading At the New York Studio School April 8, 2014 The artist will read from his newly published book Nature and Art are Physical: Writings on Art,1967-2008 (Edgewise Press, 2014). Recipient of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, 2009, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, 1998. Inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1999. Represented in major collections throughout the United States, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY; the Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Represented by Betty Cuningham Gallery, Downes lives and works in New York City and Presidio, TX. Lectures begin at 6:30, lectures are free and open to the public. Seating may be limited. 8 W 8th street, NYC
