John Chamberlain: New Work

PRESS RELEASE

John Chamberlain: New Work

27 March – 4 May 2007

Opening reception: Friday, 23 March, 5 to 7 pm

Anthony Meier Fine Arts is pleased to announce an exhibition of new work by internationally recognized artist John Chamberlain. Exhibiting since 1957, this is Chamberlain’s first one-man gallery show in San Francisco in almost 50 years. 

Born in 1927 in Rochester, Indiana, John Chamberlain grew up in Chicago and served in the U.S. Navy from 1943 to 1946 before entering the Art Institute of Chicago in 1952.  Chamberlain later spent two years (1955-56) studying at Black Mountain College in North Carolina before moving to New York City.  He made his first sculpture incorporating automobile parts in 1957, a lifelong body of work that has been credited with translating the achievements of Abstract Expressionist painting into three-dimensional form.

Chamberlain’s work was included in the Art of Assemblage exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1961, and he began showing at Leo Castelli's New York gallery in 1962. Chamberlain had his first retrospective in 1971, at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, held a second retrospective in 1986.  His museum and gallery exhibitions have covered the globe; this show at Anthony Meier Fine Arts reinforces Chamberlains continued energy and freshness.  

In addition to his manipulated metal sculptures, Chamberlain has worked in mediums as varied as foam rubber, paper, foil and Plexiglas.  This exhibition will feature his first weatherproof sculptures, massive painted aluminum works able to be displayed outdoors.  The show will also include large-scale inkjet paintings of manipulated photographs.