Sam Gilliam

October 1 – 31, 2020

Sam Gilliam, Installation View, 2020, HEMPHILL, Washington DC

Shimmering Pisces, 1976, diptych, 47 7/8" x 90" x 3" inches each

Sam Gilliam, 2020, HEMPHILL, Washington DC

Sam Gilliam, October 1 - October 31, 2020, presents a selection of paintings and works on paper created between 1976 and 1993. This show reveals an artist never at rest, always pushing forward.

Sam Gilliam (American, b. 1933) was born in Tupelo, MI, 1933, and was raised in Louisville, KY. Since the early 1960s, Gilliam has been recognized as an original and innovative Color Field painter and is associated with the Washington Color School. To his early works in the 60's and 70's on stretched, then draped, and more recently wrapped canvas, Gilliam added sculptural elements as extensions of his surface thereby making uniquely shaped works. In the early 1980s, he began cutting and rearranging thickly painted segments of acrylic paint and gel compounds, adding sculptural elements, liberating the canvas from its frame and making three-dimensional sculptural paintings.