Clinton Hill (1922-2003)
Untitled
Gouache on paper
Executed circa 1960
5054
Clinton Hill (1922–2003) was an American abstract artist who created abstract color
compositions on canvas, constructions made from wood and canvas, wood and plastic
relief sculptures, collage, woodblock prints and unique assemblages of handmade paper.
Born in Fayette, Idaho, and raised on a working ranch, Clinton Hill served in the navy during
World War II as commander of a minesweeper in the Pacific. Upon his return from service,
Hill attended the University of Oregon from which he graduated in 1947. He then moved
to New York City where Hill attended the Brooklyn Museum Art School from 1949 to 1951.
In 1951 he left for Paris where he furthered his art studies on the GI Bill at the Academie
de la Grande Chaumiere and then on to Florence, Italy where Hill studied painting at the
Instituto d’Art Statale. Upon returning to NY, Hill prepared for his first solo exhibition at
the Zabriskie Gallery. His friend Mark Rothko suggested the name of the show “Ladders
and Windows;” and from that exhibit in 1955 forward, Hill had numerous one man shows
in both the US and Europe. Over a 55 year period Clinton Hill has been included in close
to 100 exhibitions. In 1958 Hill traveled to India on a Fulbright scholarship. Since the late
eighties he produced pieces with a linear element running through the handmade paper,
and sculptural forms utilizing wood, charcoal and oil, sometimes attached to canvas and
sometimes freestanding pieces, using similar color balances. For over 20 years he was
Professor of Painting at Queens College of the City University of New York.
Solo exhibitions:
2011 Pavel Zoubok Gallery, New York, NY.
2011 Meredith Ward Fine Art, New York, NY.
2009 Melissa Morgan Fine Art, Palm Desert, CA.
2009 Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, Eugene, OR.
2003 Goldwin-Ternbach Museum at Queens College, NY.
2001-1993 Andre Zarre Gallery, New York City, NY.
1996 Vesti Dane, Scottsdale, AZ.
1993 University of Oregon, Museum of Art. Eugene, OR.
1992 Worchester Art Museum, Worchester, MA.
1992-1979 Marilyn Pearl Gallery, New York City, NY.
1987 Villa Borzino, Busalla, Italy
1985 William Sawyer Gallery, San Francisco, CA.
1984 Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
1984 Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
1984 Galeria Blu, Milan, Italy
1982 Sergio Tosi Stampatore, New York, NY.
1981 Montclaire Museum of Art, Montclaire, NJ.
1980-1977 Zola/Leiberman Gallery, Chicago, IL.
1979 Zoller Gallery, Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA.
1978 Columbia Gallery, Columbia College, Chicago, IL.
1978 Landmark Gallery, New York, NY.
1978 University of West Florida, Pensacola, FL.
1977 Jorgenson Gallery, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT.
1976 Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris, France
1976 Foster Gallery, University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire, WI.
1975-1955 Zabriskie Gallery, New York, NY
1974 Bennington College, Bennington, VT.
1973 Queens College, Flushing, NY.
1957 Phoenix Arizona Museum of Art, Phoenix, AZ.
1954 Korman Gallery, New York, NY.
Select group exhibitions:
2003 Annual Exhibition National Academy of Design, New York, NY. (2001, 2000, 1997)
2000 Toward the New: American Abstract Artists, Hillwood Art Museum, C.W. Post
Campus, Long Island University
THE PAPER TRAIL: Douglas Howell and Four Pioneers In American Handmade
Paper, Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey 175th Annual National Academy of Design, New York, NY (Emil and Dines
Carlsen Award)
1998 Fete ses Anes, 1968-1998, Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris (catalogue illustration)
1997 American Modernist Works on Paper 1924-1956
Susan Teller Gallery, New York, NY. Abstraction
INDEX (Vincent Longo, Curator), Condeso/Lawler Gallery, NY
1996 Pioneers of Abstract Art, American Abstract Artists, 1936-96, Sidney Mishkin
Gallery, Baruch College, City University of New York 49th Annual Purchase
Exhibition, American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York, NY.
1994 Contemporary American Works on Paper, University of Michigan, Dearborn American Woodcuts of the 1950 Susan Teller Gallery, New York, NY.
1993 2nd Annual Drawing Exhibition, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH.
1992 “The Persistence of Abstraction” American Abstract Artists, 56th Annual Exhibition,
Edwin Aulrich Museum, Wichita, KA
1991 Basel Art Fair, Switzerland
“Spectrum of Innovation of Color in American Printmaking, (Travelling Exhibition
Curated by David Acton)
Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, TX
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO
Worcester Art Museum, Worchester, MA.
Post-War Geometric Concepts, Marilyn Pearl Gallery, NYC
Galerie Lopes, Zurich, Switzerland
1990 SOHO in Oswego: New York Art Gallery, State University of New York at Oswego, NY
Basel Art Fair, Switzerland
1989 Basel Art Fair, Switzerland
1986 International Paper Biennale, Leopold-Hoesch Museum, Duren, Germany.
American Art of the Heart, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY
New Work, Alice Simsar Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI
Humanism in American Painting, The Severe and the Romantic: Geometric
1950’s-1980’s Marilyn Pearl Gallery, NYC
1985 Plastics!?, Marilyn Pearl Gallery, NYC
American Art of the Heart, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY
1984 Artists toys, Vanderwoue-Tananbaum Gallery, NYC
1983 Prints From Blocks: Gauguin Now, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY.
Paper as Image, Arts Council of Great Britain (traveling exhibition)
1982 Inaugural Exhibition, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
the Handmade Paper Book, American Craft Museum, New York, NY.
1981 Paper: Surface and Image, Print Council of New Jersey, Sommerville; Philadelphia
Art Alliance; Pittsburg Center for the Arts
1980 With Paper, About Paper, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
Pages: Artists Books, New England Foundation for the Arts, Boston (traveling
exhibition)
1978 Paper as a Medium, Smithsonian Institute Washington. DC (traveling exhibition)
Handmade Paper Object, Williams College Museum of art, Williams, MA.
New Ways with Paper National Collection of Fine Arts, Washington, DC
Painting and sculpture Today, Indianapolis Museum of Art
Paper, Dayton Art Institute, Ohio
Three Abstract Painters, Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris
Two Decades of American Printmaking, Worcester Art Museum
1977 Drawing and Collage, Grey Art Gallery, New York University, New York, NY.
Paper Art, Long Art Gallery, Scripps College, Claremont, CA.
The Material Dominant, Zoller Gallery, Pennsylvania State University, Park, PA.
Aspects of Collage, Bard Callege, NY.
1976 Handmade Paper Object, Santa Barbara Museum, CA; Jacksonville Museum of
Art, FL. Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston; National Print Exhibition, Brooklyn Museum of Art (1975)
Work on Handmade Paper, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY.
Printmaking, New Forms, Whitney Museum Downtown, New York, NY.
1975
1963
1959
1958
1957
1956
1951
Art of Paper, Weatherspoon Art Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greensboro
Society for Contemporary Art, Art Institute of Chicago
Recent Acquisitions, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Collage in America, American Federation of the Arts, NY (traveling exhibition)
Curators Choice, Baltimore Museum of Art
Zabriskie Gallery, New York, NY.
International Watercolor Biennial, Brooklyn Museum of Art
Selected public collections:
Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
American Abstract Artists Portfolio (British Museum; Fogg Museum; Guggenheim
Museum; Princeton University Library; Seldon Swope Art Museum; Whitney Museum of
American Art; Wichita Museum of Art)
Arizona State Museum, Tempe
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Baltimore Museum of Art, MD
Brooklyn Museum of Art, NY
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
The Godwin-Ternbach Museum, Queens College, CUNY
Guild Hall, East Hampton, NY
Hood Museum, Dartmouth College, Hanover NH
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Montclair Art Museum, NJ
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
National Academy of Design, New York, NY
New Jersey State Museum, Trenton
New York Public Library, Miriam And Ira D. Wallach Print Collection
University of Oregon Museum of Art, Eugene
Philadelphia Museum of Art
Phoenix Art Museum
Port Authority, City of New York
Santa Barbara Museum CA
Weatherspoon Art Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greensboro
William Benton Museum of Art, University of Connecticut, Storrs
University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire
Worcester Art Museum
Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum, State University of New Jersey, Rutgers, New
Brunswick
Selected publications:
Books:
Una Johnson. American Prints and Printmakers. (Doubleday, 1980)
Jules Heller. Papermaking. (Watson-Guptil, 1978)
Leo Steinberg. Other Criteria. (Oxford University Press, 1972)
Harriet Janis & Rudi Blesh. Collage. (Chilton Co., 1962).
Catalogues:
Amy Winter. Clinton Hill, 1980-2002. The Godwin-Ternbach Museum, Queens College,
CUNY, 2003.
Andrea S Honore. Paper-Trail: Douglas Howell and four Pioneers in American Handmade
Paper. State University of New Jersey, Rutgers, 2000.
Joan Price. Toward the New American Abstract Artists. Hillwood Art Museum, C.W. Post
Campus, Long Island University, 2000.
Pioneers of Abstract Art, American Abstract Artists. Sidney Mishkin Gallery, Baruch College,
CUNY, 1996.
American Abstract Artists. American Academy of Arts and Letters, 60th Anniversary
Exhibition, New York 1995.
David Action. A Spectrum of Innovation: Color in American Printmaking, 1890-196
Worcester Art Museum 1990.
Three Hundred Years of American Painting: The Montclair Art Museum Collection, 1989.
Stephen Westfall. Clinton Hill Marilyn Pearl Gallery, New York, 1988.
International Biennial of Paper Art: Handmade Paper. Leopold-Hoesch Museum, Duren,
Germany, 1986.
American Watercolors, Pastels, Collages: an illustrated listing of works in the Brooklyn
Museum Collection, 1984
Linda Crucker Simmons. American Drawings in the Collection of the Corcoran Gallery of
Art, 1983
Paper as Image. Arts Council of Great Britain 1983
Making Paper. American Crafts Council, 1982
Martica Sawin. Clinton Hill: Paintings and Paperworks. Montclair Art Museum, 1981
Charlotta Kotik. With Paper, About Paper. Buffalo Fine Arts Acadamy,1980
Paulette Long Paper- Art and Technology. World Print Council, San Francisco 1979.
Jane M Farmer. Paper as a Medium. Smithsonian Institution, 1978.
Janet A Flint New Way with Paper. National Collection of Fine Arts, 1978
Hilary D. Basset Painting and Sculpture Today. Indianapolis Museum of Art. 1978
Pamela Houk. Paper. Dayton Art institute. 1978
Paper Art. Long Art Gallery, Scripps College, Claremont, CA, 1977.
Periodicals:
Artforum
Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe, Clinton Hill, recent works, v.18 (Sept. 1979): 68-69; Jeremy GilbertRolfe (December 1973); Robert Pincus-Witten(May 1971); Emily Wasserman (Summer
1969)
Art In America
Jonathan Goodman (September 2001); Lawrence Cambell, Marilyn Pearl Gallery, New
York, NY, v.74 (November 1986): 173-73; Anonymous (November/December 1967).
Art International
Gerrit Henry, The Permitting Medium: A Note on the Painting of Clinton Hill: 13 (Summer
1974); Michael Peppiat (September 1974);April Kingsley (December 1973).
Arts Magazine
Stephen Westfall, Clinton Hill v 55 (February 1981): 29; Douglas Welsh (September 1980)
Martica Sawin, Clinton Hill v 53 (may 1979): 3; Martica Sawin (Nevember 1978); Gordon
Brown (September 1975): Jane Bell, Zabriskie Gallery, New York, v. 48 (November 1973);
64; Rackstraw Downs (May 1969; March 1971); Vincent Longo. Studio Talk: Interview
(September 1956); Hilton Kramer (November 1955: February 1954).