Ellen Berkenblit makes bold paintings that blend formal experimentation and a virtuoso handling of color and line with an ever-evolving pictorial calligraphy including a woman in profile, animals and birds, abstracted flowers and plant-like shapes. Berkenblit employs an intoxicating palette ranging from dirty pinks and muted flesh tones to acid greens and vibrant blues and reds that pop against rich velvety blacks and umbers. Composed intuitively, her paintings evoke an innate physicality as Berkenblit builds the images through brushstrokes—like sub-conscious electrical surges—that dictate the composition. For the artist, the alchemical nature of paint and pigment demonstrate a synesthesia as colors evoke sounds and tastes, and figures emerge as the natural expression of her painting process.
Ellen Berkenblit was born in 1958 in Paterson, New Jersey, and lives and works in New York. She received her BFA from Cooper Union in 1980. She was a Guggenheim fellow in 2014. In 2019 she created Leopard’s Lane, a site-specific mural for the MCA Chicago’s Atrium Project. Recent solo exhibitions include the Drawing Center, New York; Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels; Anton Kern Gallery, New York; and Vielmetter Los Angeles. Her work is in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, among others.
- 1958
- 1980
Selected Solo and Two Person Exhibitions
- 2024
- 2023
- 2022
- 2021
- 2020
- 2019
- 2018
- 2017
- 2016
- 2015
- 2012
- 2009
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- 1996
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- 1992
- 1986
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- 1984
Selected Group Exhibitions
- 2023
- 2022
- 2021
- 2020
- 2019
- 2019-2020
- 2019
- 2018
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- 2016
- 2015
- 2014
- 2013
- 2011
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- 1995
- 1994
- 1993
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- 1986
- 1985
- 1984
- 1983
Group Exhibition Catalogues and Books
- 2018
- 2014
- 2007
- 1999
- 1992
Bibliography
- 2024
- 2023
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- 2019
- 2018
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- 2012
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- 1996
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- 1987
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- 1983
Awards, Grants and Fellowships
- 2022
- 2014
Public Collections