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Untitled (3.11.72), 1972, Ink and wash on paper, 15” x 12”
For over half a century, Frank Lobdell's work has immeasurably enriched the local and national cultural landscape. His stature is reflected in the acclaim of art critics, in the respect of fellow artists, and in the admiration of his students, regardless of their personal artistic philosophies. To state that Lobdell is "an artist's artist" is to acknowledge that he has pursued his calling with passion, discipline, and integrity, and that he has elevated the creation of art above its reception in the art world.
Lobdell's diverse body of work is linked by its shared sense of humanity. In the 1940s, he was among the pioneers of the San Francisco Bay Area school of abstract expressionism. During the 1950s, he gradually reintroduced the human figure into his work, thus expanding conventional conceptions of both abstraction and figuration. Drawing inspiration from the vision of Francisco Goya, these works presented a dark, existential worldview shaped by the cumulative horrors of World War II, the Holocaust, the atomic bomb, and the Korean War.
In the 1960s and 1970s, Lobdell expanded the scale and scope of his figures, which now actively asserted their humanity in opposition to the threat posed by the war in Vietnam. From the 1980s to the present, he has developed a resonant new language of signs, one that suggests the primordial and the mythic are not relegated to the past, but still alive and vital in the present. Equating art and life on the most fundamental level, these recent works reconnect contemporary viewers with the eternal physical and spiritual struggle of the artist—and of humankind—for making and meaning.
BORN 1921, Kansas City, Missouri
EDUCATION
1939-40 St. Paul School of Fine Arts, St. Paul, MN
1947-50 California School of Fine Arts, San Francisco (now San Francisco Art Institute)
1950-51 L’Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris
TEACHING
1957-65 California School of Fine Arts (San Francisco Art Institute)
1966-91 Stanford University, Stanford, CA. Professor of art; appointed Paul L.
and Phyllis Wattis Professor of Art, 1989
VISITING ARTIST/ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE
1948 College of the Pacific, Stockton, CA. Instructor, summer session
1948-49 California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco. Painting instructor
1964 Artist-in-Residence, Stanford University, Stanford, CA
1966 Fellow, Tamarind Lithography Workshop, Los Angeles, CA
1984 Visiting Artist, Skowhegan School, Skowhegan, ME
1985 Visiting Artist, Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, PA
1986 Artist-in-Residence, New York Studio School of Drawing and Painting,
New York, NY, June 9–August 1
1992 Visiting Artist (with David Kelso), Yale University School of Art, February
1993 Visiting Artist, Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia
Visiting Artist, Vermont Studio Center, Johnson
GRANTS AND AWARDS
1947 First Prize (oil painting), Minnesota State Fair
1948 Artists’ Council Prize, Twelfth Annual Drawing and Print Exhibition,
San Francisco Art Association
1950 San Francisco Bank Prize, 69th Annual Oil, Tempera, and Sculpture Exhibition,
San Francisco Art Association
Purchase Prize, 14th Annual Drawing and Paint Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association
1960 Nealie Sullivan Annual Award for a California Artist, San Francisco Art Association
1986 Pew Foundation Grant, awarded through Stanford University
1988 Medal for Distinguished Achievement in Painting, American Academy and Institute of Arts
and Letters, New York
1992 Academy Purchase Award, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, NY
1994 Academy Purchase Award, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, NY
1998 Elected to National Academy of Design
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
1948 College of the Pacific, Stockton, CA
1958 Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, June
1960 M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: An Exhibition of Paintings,
January 19–February 18. Brochure
Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, Frank Lobdell: Catalogue of Paintings 1953–1959,
April 19–May 7. Catalogue
1962 Ferus Gallery, Los Angeles, April 16–May 5
1963 Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, Frank Lobdell: Paintings and Drawings, April 30–May 21
1964 Galerie D. Benador, Geneva, Switzerland, Frank Lobdell: Peintures, Gouaches,
Dessins, November–December.
1965 Galerie Anderson-Mayer, Paris, April 7–May. Catalogue
1966 Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena, CA, Frank Lobdell: Paintings and Graphics from
1948 to 1965 (organized by Walter Hopps), March 15–April 10. Travel to Stanford Art
Museum, Stanford, CA, May 1–31. Catalogue
Stanford Art Gallery, Stanford, CA, November 5–December 4
San Jose City College, San Jose, CA, December 5–19
1967 Marylhurst College, Portland, OR, Lithographs by Frank Lobdell, October– December
1969 San Francisco Museum of Art, Frank Lobdell: Twenty-Seven Lithographs and
A Large Painting, January 21–February 16. Brochure
1971 Cheney Cowles Museum, Eastern Washington University, Spokane
St. Mary’s College Art Gallery, Moraga, CA, Frank Lobdell: Paintings–Drawings, May 1–28
1972 Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, Frank Lobdell: Paintings, 1969–1971,
March 1–25. Brochure
1974 Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, Frank Lobdell, Paintings and Drawings,
1955–1973, October 17–November 16. Brochure
1975 Martha Jackson Gallery, New York
1977 Smith Andersen Gallery, Palo Alto, CA, Monotypes
1978 Smith Andersen Gallery, Palo Alto, CA
1981 Wiegand Gallery, College of Notre Dame, Belmont, CA. Frank Lobdell: Summer Mural
and Preparatory Drawings. Travel to Pepperdine University Art Gallery, Malibu, CA,
October 25–November 25; Reed College Art Gallery, Portland, OR. Catalogue
Smith Andersen Gallery, Palo Alto, CA, Drawings and Prints
1982 Smith Andersen Gallery, 2140 Bush Street, San Francisco, February 27–March 27
Oscarsson-Hood Gallery, New York, December 1982–January 1983
1983 San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Frank Lobdell: Paintings and Monotypes,
January 20–March 27. Catalogue
Oscarsson-Hood Gallery, New York, Frank Lobdell: Recent Paintings and
Monotypes, December 7, 1983–January 7, 1984. Brochure
1985 Oscarsson-Hood Gallery, New York, Frank Lobdell: Paintings and Gouaches,
1958–1972, February 27–March 30. Brochure
Tyler Gallery, Temple University, Philadelphia, November 15–December 12
Tyler School of Art, Temple University, Philadelphia, November 20–December 14
1987 John Berggruen Gallery, San Francisco, March 10–April 4
1988 Charles Campbell Gallery, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: Figure Drawings
1964–1974, September 27–October 29. Catalogue
Stanford University Museum of Art, Frank Lobdell: Recent Etchings and Aquatints,
September 27–November 27
1990 Campbell-Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: Recent Paintings, Drawings,
Prints, September 4–October 13
1991 Smith Andersen Gallery, Palo Alto, CA, Frank Lobdell: Recent Monotypes,
November 22, 1991–January 4, 1992
Campbell-Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco
1992 M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco,
Viewpoints XVIII: Frank Lobdell. Brochure
Campbell-Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: New Work,
September 1–October 10. Catalogue
1993 Stanford University Museum of Art, Frank Lobdell: Works, 1947–1992,
January 12–April 25. Catalogue
1995 Campbell-Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco
Printworks, Chicago, Frank Lobdell, Aquatint Etchings
1998 Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Etchings by Frank Lobdell
Campbell-Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco
Shorenstein Building, 425 Market Street, San Francisco
Hearst Art Gallery, St. Mary’s College, Moraga, CA, Frank Lobdell: Master Artist V,
October 11–December 20. Catalogue
Printworks, Chicago, Frank Lobdell, Recent Prints, November 17–January 6
2000 Campbell-Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: Recent Paintings and
Drawings, May 2–June 3
The Art Exchange, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: A Decade of Etchings, September
2002 Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: Three Phases, 1947–2001,
March 7–30. Catalogue
Charles Cowles Gallery, New York, Frank Lobdell: Early Works, November 23- December 21
2003 Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco,
Frank Lobdell: The Art of Making and Meaning, March 1-May 25. Catalogue
Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell: Early Figurative Drawings,
March 6-29
B. Sakata Garo, Sacramento, CA, Frank Lobdell: Etchings & Aquatints, May 6-31
2004 Portland Art Museum, Portland, OR, Frank Lobdell: Making and Meaning, May 22– August 29
Hackett-Freedman Gallery, San Francisco, Frank Lobdell, Recent Work: 1990–2004,
Oct. 14-–Nov. 27. Catalogue
Fresno Art Museum, Fresno, CA, Frank Lobdell: The Art of Making and Meaning,
Nov. 16, 2004–Jan. 16, 2005
2005 Fresno Art Museum, Fresno, CA, Frank Lobdell: The Art of Making and Meaning,
Nov. 16, 2004–Jan. 16, 2005
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