Gallery Talk at HEMPHILL Artworks
April 27, 2024
11 am - 12:30 pm

Please join us on Saturday, April 27, 2024, the final day of STEVEN CUSHNER, for a gallery talk with the artist and painting conservator, Jay Krueger. 

The discussion between Cushner and Krueger is sure to attract a working artist-audience. If you are not an artist, you will find the insider conversation fascinating. Space is limited.

Click here reserve your spot.

This talk coincides with the exhibition, STEVEN CUSHNER, on view at HEMPHILL through April 27, 2024. Since 1998, the ART TALKS series at Hemphill has included educational lectures on topics such as collecting for beginners, artist talks, and panel discussions on issues in contemporary art.

November 10, 2023

Massive curving forms, abstract but suggestive of nature, link the styles of sculptor Rachel Rotenberg and painter Steven Cushner. The concurrent surveys of the two veteran artists’ work at the American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center are extensive, but not career spanning. Both exhibitions focus on pieces made in the past few years.

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American University's Studio Art MFA program presents an artist talk with Steven Cushner in Katzen 201

Steven and Stan are childhood friends. They studied art together as high school students and went off to art school. Steven has lived in Washington DC for 45 years. After earning his MFA, Steven spent 10 years as an art handler, then began a long teaching career. He has lived and worked in the same house and studio for close to 40 years. Stan has worked as a framer, museum exhibition specialist, studio assistant, gallery owner, and usher at Wrigley Field. Between them, they have 90 years of living and working experience in the art world and have many stories to share.

Presented in conjunction with CUSHNER on view at the American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center through December 10.

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October 7, 2023
2 - 3 pm

Is it the fight of the century, a marriage of convenience, or the complete happiness package? The relationship between architecture and art, or better said, the conflict that can arise between the ambitions of the artist and those of the architect, can work to create a sublime or less than excellent experience. We've all seen it go wrong — "Oh look, the pillows on the sofa match the curtains," and felt embarrassed. Join us for a conversation between two creators at the height of their careers as they speak on integrating art and architecture...

Click here reserve your spot.

This talk coincides with the exhibition, CUSHNER, on view at the American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center through December 10, 2023.

American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center
September 9 - December 10, 2023

CUSHNER refers to and builds upon a solidly stylistic through-line from Steven Cushner’s past work to present work. More importantly, through the conscious manipulation of an array of subtlety, color choices and scale, Cushner pulls new experiences from his established style of painting. This is not a retrospective of the artist’s forty-plus year career; it’s a selection of what is happening in his studio today. The pieces range from small scale works on paper and wood cut prints to large scale paintings. The exhibition presents a mature artist at a powerful moment in his career. 

AU Museum partnered with HEMPHILL Artworks to develop this showing of Cushner’s more recent works in one of the largest exhibitions of his work to date. CUSHNER will give viewers a rare chance to view some of the artist’s monumental paintings up close.

Click here to learn more. 

Steven Cushner was commissioned to create a monumental canvas for the entrance hall of the new United States Embassy in Ankara, Turkey, designed by Ennead Architects. "Endless Fountain," completed in 2020, in dialogue with the new Embassy's vast public-facing space, is an endlessly flowing composition influenced by concepts of moving waves, cascading water, landscape forms, and the horizon where water may meet both land and sky.

Special Event & Fundraiser with artist Steven Cushner at
Art Enables
2204 Rhode Island Avenue NW
Washington DC 20018

More Info / Purchase Tickets

The three solo shows at Hemphill Artworks don’t add up to an overview of the evolution of abstract painting, and aren’t meant to. Still, the progression from Leon Berkowitz’s luminous austerity to Steven Cushner’s totemic imagery to E.E. Ikeler’s mixed-media intricacy does demonstrate intriguing generational shifts. Over a half-century of this trio’s nonrepresentational art, things get funkier and funkier.

This coloring book was created during the shelter-in-place period of 2020. Thanks to the artists for their participation and inspiration. Art endures and so will we. Be well and thank you for continued support. 

Steven Cushner is known for experimenting with motifs across all mediums, including drawings, paintings, and prints. Please enjoy this short video detailing the conception and evolution of a single motif in many forms, Fan.

John Anderson, Washington City Paper

The recent exhibitions at Hemphill Fine Art are about putting in the time. It is likely most people don’t consider artists as ones who punch clocks to produce work. This is an exhibition that dispels the myth that an artist must be moved by some unforeseen “inspiration” as the modus operandi behind how an abstract artwork gets made.

Mark Jenkins, The Washington Post

Mark Jenkins, The Washington Post

35 Days is "a museum-worthy survey of D.C. art."

Stephanie Rudig, Washington City Paper

"This isn’t just a Color School roundup, however: The show includes artists deploying color to completely different ends, like the trippy pattern-based work of Hedieh Javanshir Ilchi, as well as some varying landscape photography artists like Anne Rowland and William Christenberry."

Maura Judkis, The Washington Post

"'I wanted to do a painting that I didn’t know how to do,' he says. He didn’t know how to paint big."

Mark Jenkins, The Washington Post

"Several mini-shows nestle within “Represent,” Hemphill Fine Arts’s 20th-anniversary exhibition."

Mark Jenkins, The Washington Post

"This year marks the 20th anniversary of George Hemphill’s gallery, Hemphill Fine Arts. And it’s been two decades since Steven Cushner stopped making rounded-edge canvases. Those two histories overlap in 'Steven Cushner: The Shaped Paintings, 1991-1993,' a Hemphill show that doesn’t seem backward-gazing."

Kriston Capps, Washington City Paper

"Twenty years later, Cushner’s work still needs time—but then, his paintings have always demanded first, second, and third looks from viewers."

Cara Ober, Bmore Art

"Examining the images for this exhibit I am struck by how au courant these twenty-year-old paintings feel, in an age where droves of young, Stockholder-influenced painters break the flat cube in all manner of ways."

Mark Jenkins, The Washington Post

"Either way, the two men’s art is quite compatible. Both employ muted yet complex palettes and simple, even primal, forms."

Louis Jacobson, Washington City Paper

"The exhibit is variegated, but like any good combine painting (and those are included too) it coheres pretty well despite itself, as giants like Robert Rauschenberg mix with such local figures as Joseph Mills, Mingering Mike and Colby Caldwell."

Jessica Dawson, The Washington Post

"Here hang big, striking works by Tom Downing and Jacob Kainen. Here, too, are precious works on paper by Al Jensen and Alma Thomas. That Eugene Atget picture of the taxidermist's vitrine? I'll take it."

Maura Judkis, Washington City Paper

"Unlike some of his predecessors, though, Cushner does not strive for flawlessness, and the drips and imperfections of his paintings make them more hospitable."