1960s
East Barrier, 1960, Oil on canvas, 91 3/4 x 80 7/8 in. (233 x 205.4 cm) Collection of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York, Gift of Seymour H. Knox, Jr., 1961 (K1961:7) (CR469)
Called a “Radical Pro” by Artnews, Tworkov continues a forward thrust of composing the painterly mark. Emphatic about his desire to “paint no Tworkov,” in 1965 he begins to study elementary geometry and combining this with aspects of the Fibonacci numbering system, starts a new pursuit for composing a painting. Carefully “worked out” drawings begin to proceed each new painting where varieties of spontaneous brushing become delineated by measured lines. Tworkov’s desire was to arrive at a painting style in which planning did not exclude intuitive and sometimes “random play.” Tworkov becomes the Chairman of the Art Department at Yale University in ‘64, a post he will hold until ‘69.
Exhibition highlights include: Solo exhibitions: Leo Castelli Gallery (’61, ’63), Yale Art Gallery (’63), Gertrude Kasle, Detroit (’64, ’66, ’67, ‘69). First retrospective exhibition at Whitney Museum of American Art (’64). Major group exhibitions include: Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting, Whitney Museum of American Art (’61, ’62, ’64, ’65, 67), The New American Painting and Sculpture: The First Generation, Museum of Modern Art (‘69).
