Jack Tworkov

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Jack Tworkov (19001982) was a Polish born American abstract expressionist painter.

He was born in Biała Podlaska, Russian Empire and immigrated to the United States when he was thirteen. Tworkov studied at Columbia University as well as the National Academy of Design. During the Depression Era, Tworkov met Willem de Kooning, and together with a group of other abstract expressionists including Arshile Gorky, Mark Rothko and Jackson Pollock, founded the New York School. During his lifetime, Tworkov had taught at several institutions, including the American University, Black Mountain College, Queens College, Pratt Institute, University of Minnesota, and Yale University where he became Chairman of the Art Department from 1963 - 1969.

Tworkov is considered one of the “action painters” of the Abstract expressionists of the 1940s and 1950s (such as Franz Kline and Willem de Kooning). Major work from this period is characterized by the use of gestural brush strokes. Straight lines and geometric patterns, however, characterize his later work during the 1960s.

He died in 1982 in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

[edit] References

  • Jack Tworkov Paintings 1928-1982, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, PA

ISBN 0-943836-08-5

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