Sam Gilliam: a retrospective

Sam Gilliam: a retrospective highlights the evolution of Sam Gilliam’s career through approximately 40 works from 1967 to the present. In 1968, Gilliam revolutionized painting by discarding the wooden stretchers that had always determined a painting’s shape to instead drape and suspend his rich, lyrical, color-stained canvases from the floor and ceiling. While not the first to abandon the traditional stretcher, his reconfiguration of canvas and paint into a three-dimensional installation was a precursor to the blurring of boundaries between painting, sculpture and space that characterized much of the art of the 1970s. Sam Gilliam: a retrospective includes his revolutionary draped paintings as well as his 40 years of innovative uses of space, color and light in complex multimedia work ranging from conventionally shaped paintings with beveled edges to multi-dimensional installations and sculpture. Gilliam’s evocative use of color and his expansive vision have assured his place as one of the most important abstractionists of the late 20th century.

Sam Gilliam was born in Tupelo, Mississippi and received his MA in painting from the University of Louisville. He has lived and worked in Washington, D.C. since 1962. His work has been shown in numerous exhibitions in the U.S., Europe and Asia since the early 1970s, and is included in the collections of major museums across the world, including the Tate Gallery, London; and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, and Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Sam Gilliam: a retrospective is organized by Jonathan P. Binstock, curator of contemporary art at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. The exhibition is accompanied by a major catalogue, the first fully illustrated in-depth scholarly publication devoted to the artist. The catalogue includes essays by Binstock and other scholars as well as complete documentation on the artist’s extensive public projects and on his career.

Sam Gilliam: a retrospective is organized and circulated by the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. and made possible through the generous support of The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and Ellen and Gerry Sigal.

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Sam Gilliam: a retrospective