APRIL 01 - MAY 29, 2004
The Art of Jack Jefferson
Embarcadero #4
JEF-042-OC
For me each painting is such a unique experience that I can’t worry about its degree of similarity to the last one … Intensity interests me very much,and I hope this is a bond that will give continuity to the paintings.—Jack Jefferson,1962
Hackett-Freedman Gallery is proud to present the paintings of the late and legendary San Francisco abstract expressionist Jack Jefferson. This show features over 25 major oils on canvas executed between 1947 and 1965 and is part of a joint exhibition with the Wiegand Gallery at Notre Dame de Namur University in Belmont, CA, which is exhibiting Jefferson’s later paintings on paper dating from 1968-1991. An 80-page, full-color catalogue with essays by Gerald Nordland, Charles Shere, and Charles Strong accompanies the exhibition.
Both shows offer a significant opportunity to reassess the work of this lesser-known Bay Area master at a time when museum and collector interest in American abstract expressionism is surging.
Born in Lead, South Dakota,in 1921, and orphaned by age 15, Jefferson worked in the mines in his late teens before attending the University of Iowa from 1940-1942. Two years later he joined the U.S. Marine Corps and fought in the first wave of Guadalcanal, later serving as a tailgunner.
In 1946, he settled in San Francisco and began attending the California School of Fine Arts (now the San Francisco Art Institute) where he studied under Mark Rothko and Clyfford Still, who quickly became a close personal friend. His first one-man exhibition was at the now-celebrated Metart Gallery, an artist-run cooperative that was outside the conventional gallery system on Grant Street in 1949.
Fearless and innovative, Jefferson’s work left a major mark on San Francisco painting. His unflinching honesty and pure dedication to the act of painting resulted in a body of work that is impressive for its authority and originality.
Jefferson’s work proves that abstract expressionism was not a New York-centric phenomenon but rather a national one tinged with regional accents. In this context Jefferson’s paintings evince the freedom and purity offered by the West Coast, a freedom that granted Jefferson the ability to experiment and develop a highly personal and complex language.
The Hackett-Freedman exhibition features early abstractions from 1947-49 that reveal Still’s influence and a series of “black” postwar paintings influenced by Jefferson’s wartime experiences. The exuberant and sophisticated mature works of the mid-1950s and 60s follows.
Painted in studios around San Francisco, the paintings’ titles evoke a different time in the life of the city: Labor was king; Mission Street was an industrial hub; and Harrington’s Bar in the financial district was a hangout for artists. Paintings such as Mission Street #2 A (1954) and Embarcadero #2 (1962) evince Jefferson’s mastery at blending shapes and colors into a cohesive, balanced, energetic whole.
According to Gerald Nordland, “Embarcadero #2 (1962) is a masterpiece of San Francisco painting—with exciting color and a brilliant balance—embodying the quality of energy associated with the period.”
Uninterested in self-promotion, Jefferson adhered to his mentor Clyfford Still’s dictate to become independent of “the system” of dealers, galleries, and museums. Named outstanding “New Talent” in 1956 by Art in America, Jefferson never sought to capitalize on that recognition. Rather he continued his own internal push to reach for what critic Charles Shere calls, “a final expression of lyrical purity.”
A teacher at the San Francisco Art Institute for twenty years, Jefferson exhibited rarely for most of his career. In the late 1960s, he developed severe allergies to oil paint and began working with mixed media on paper, creating a series of works that, in the words of noted critic Thomas Albright, “possess an intensity of lyricism and drama that totally belies their scale.”
He was included in the 1975 Whitney Biennial and honored by the Peter and Madeleine Martin Foundation for the Creative Arts in 1996. He passed away on November 5, 2000, following a prolonged period of ill health.
The following year, the San Jose Museum of Art mounted “Jack Jefferson (1920 -2000); A Memorial Exhibition.” Jefferson’s work is included in several notable public collections including the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the San Jose Museum of Art, and the Oakland Museum of California.
