MULDOON ELDER BIO

Born Michael Muldoon Elder on July 24th, 1935, he was educated at Loyola High School in Los Angeles, class of 1953 and Whittier College, class of 1957.

Receiving prestigious purchase awards for his paintings from two museums while still in college as a mathematics major, Elder forsook mathematics and set about a successful career as an artist exhibiting paintings, drawings, mosaics, and sculpture at the Jon Hellend Gallery in La Jolla California as well as various other venues throughout Southern California. This was interrupted by a two-year hiatus as the result of being drafted by the United States Army in 1958. Elder was then stationed with The 41st Infantry at Fort Hood, Texas where his paintings were exhibited at The Dallas Museum of Art, The Houston Museum of Contemporary Art, The Fort Worth Museum of Art and five private galleries in those cities. In 1959, as well as being invited to exhibit “jury-free” at the prestigious São Paulo Trianale, Elder won the World-wide All Army Purchase Award Art Contest with the oil painting, “Night Ballet,” that hangs in the Pentagon Collection in Washington D.C. While in the army, Elder also painted award-winning murals and taught painting and drawing to officers’ wives and talented soldiers.

Returning to civilian life in 1960, Elder’s art became extremely under-appreciated and esoteric, thus he lived an impoverished existence for the following two years dwelling in a mountain cabin in Palmer Canyon, Claremont, California where he was supported by his companion, Bernell Blain, a high school teacher and actress who had returned from Texas with him to California. During that time, as a side activity, Elder acted in Dylan Thomas’s “Under Milkwood” and became the director of The Valley Community Theater where he produced and directed avant-garde plays such as Eugene Ionesco’s “The Bald Soprano,” “The Lesson,” and “Foursome,” as well as Michel De Ghelderode’s marvelously bizarre play, “Pantagleize” and Bertolt Brecht’s “The Good Woman of Setzuan” in an innovative and hugely successful amphitheater production.

In 1961, Elder moved to San Francisco where he founded The Vorpal Gallery, a venue he dedicated to exposing very talented but little known artists as well as his own works of art that he continued to create. In 1963, aside from continuing his own work, Elder became the art editor of the avant-garde literary magazine, “Genesis West.” In 1974, he opened the SoHo, New York branch of The Vorpal Gallery. Within a few years, many of the relatively unknown artists that he represented became household names in the art world, such as two artists who are now recognized as ranking among the great print masters of the Twentieth Century, Yozo Hamaguchi and M.C. Escher.

Elder’s own paintings and drawings continued to regain acclaim as in The Best of Show judged by Thomas Albright in The 1968 San Francisco Annual, and the acquisition of a number of his paintings by The Syntex Collection. At the same time he produced extremely innovative award winning documentary films on art. But though continuing to regularly create new paintings and drawings, as of 1969 he entirely withdrew his own art from exhibition exposure. His estate presently contains over two thousand of his drawings and one hundred and seventy canvases of his own creation but these works are rarely offered for public purchase.

MULDOON ELDER: Exhibitions

Long Beach Museum of ArtDowney Art MuseumLos Angeles Municipal Art GalleryJon Helland Gallery, La JollaVorpal Gallery New YorkNewport Harbor Art MuseumOakland Art MuseumVorpal Gallery, San FranciscoSan Francisco Museum of Modern ArtDallas Museum of ArtContemporary Arts Museum, Houston*The Black Tulip Gallery, DallasThe Gallery, Fort Worth, TXThe Richmond Art CenterPentagon Collection, Washington D.C.Modern Art Museum of Fort WorthSan Antonio Museum of ArtVorpal Gallery, ChicagoStanford Museum of ArtWhittier Art Club Museum Vorpal Gallery Laguna BeachVillage Theater Exhibitions, Claremont CASão Paulo Art Biennial InvitationalSanta Barbara Art MuseumThe Houston Gallery, Meredith Long & Company

PRAISE“Muldoon Elder is one of my absolutely favorite, though relatively unknown, San Francisco artists. His brilliant and innovative paintings and drawings frankly put the works of many more recognized artists to abysmal shame. I’m amazed and also impressed that he has been content and even pleased to remain in the relative shadows of our known art world.” __ Henry Hopkins, Director, SF MoMA 1974-86

“The remarkable paintings of Muldoon Elder are a shoe-in to win purchase awards from any major open museum competition that Elder might care to enter.” _Rudy Turk, Director, The Richmond Art Center, 1963. Subsequently Director, San Diego Museum of Art.

“His paintings are ravishing!” _Peter Selz Head Curator, New York MoMA 1958-65.

“One of the finest artists whose studio I have been privleged to visit.” _Frederick Hartt, Art Historian 1982

“Total genius.” _John Maxon, Director, The Art Institute of Chicago, 1959-66.

“Muldoon Elder’s later works are sometimes like Jackson Pollock only better.” _Director, Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art. 1986.

“Ive always read his letters to me to my classes. His ground-breaking theories are not only exciting but quite likely true.” _John Rewald, Art Historian, 1966.

“Beautiful and amazingly inventive with a remarkably intricate and mysterious underlying intelligence.” _Ahmet Ertegun, Art Collector and Founder of Atlantic Records. 1973

“Elder’s new abstractions are cosmic landscapes, and, like most things of cosmic magnitude, they are also introspective nature poetry, which are tightly wefted tapestries that sing with movement, space, and a remarkably sensuous colorism… But the real life of these paintings lies in the elusive, changing forms which emerge out of the mote-filled ‘spaces’… ”. _Thomas Albright, San Francisco Chronicle. 1968.

“I'm enjoying his latest artwork very much. They talked about van Gogh painting energy…a la Starry Night. Well, Muldoon Elder is painting energy…The eco-energy system without and within. Impressive. Imaginative. Deep.” _Georganne White, painter and printmaker. Portland Oregon. 2012.

“Hauntingly beautiful. Very strong.” _ Michael Dunev DunevArtProjects, Torroella, Spain. 2013.

Legend has it that the River Ganges comes down from the heavens and, so that it won’t pierce a hole through the earth, lands on the bent-over back of a god, flows, and is the source of all life.

COMMENTARY BACKGROUND

Henry T. Hopkins is a distinguished museum director and educator who played a leading role in establishing Los Angeles' art scene, died in 2009 at the age of 81. Hopkins achieved national prominence as director of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art from 1974 to 1986, but he got his professional start at UCLA and returned there in later years.

"He was a genteel, highly intelligent and discerning man," said Christopher Waterman, dean of UCLA’s School of the Arts and Architecture. "No one had more to do with establishing the very high quality of the visual art programs at our university, including the academic programs and the Hammer Museum. He chaired the art department from 1991 to 1994 and ran the Wight Art Gallery, and later became the first director of the Hammer Museum." After the death of oilman and museum founder, Armand harrer, http://articles.latimes.com/1990-12-11/news/mn-6314_1_armand-hammer Armand Hammer , Hopkins helped UCLA negotiate a complicated contract that put the university in charge of the Westwood museum's management and programs, Waterman said. Hopkins "stepped down in '98, but he paved the way for what Ann Philbin has been able to do," Waterman said, referring to Hopkins' successor, who has transformed the Hammer into a high-profile exhibition center for contemporary art.

Stephanie Barron, senior curator of modern art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, said Hopkins' death is "the loss of one of the great advocates in the world for Southern California art."

Hopkins and Barron joined forces last year in a $1-million campaign to purchase “The Illegal Operation,” a controversial work by Edward Kienholz, for LACMA. Hopkins also encouraged the Getty Research Institute to develop programs about the history of Southern California art, including a series of exhibitions planned throughout the region in 2011. "The bottom line," said Jay Belloli, director of art programs at the Armory Center for the Arts in Pasadena, "is that it's inconceivable to think of contemporary art in Southern California without acknowledging Henry’s incredible importance.

Maxon, John [Moore]

Date Born:  1916

Place born:  Salt Lake City, UT

Date died:  1977

Place died:  Chicago, IL

HDescrip:  Maxon studied at the Cooper Union between 1934 and 1938.  He received his bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan in 1941.  He attended Harvard University where he received his master's degree in 1945 and Ph.D. in 1948 on the subject of Tintoretto.  That year he accepted a position as director of the University of Kansas Art Museum in Lawrence, KS.  In 1952 he moved to be director of the art museum at the Rhode Island School of Design.  In 1959 Maxon was appointed director of fine arts at the Art Institute of Chicago, replacing Daniel Catton Rich (q.v.). At Chicago, he was responsible for the early "blockbuster" shows, including Treasures of Versailles (1962) and Treasures of Poland (1966).  He was-

Associate Director of the Institute between 1966 and 1972. In 1970 Maxon issued the survey catalog for the Art Institute, published by Harry N. Abrams. Shows featuring artists of the Institute's strength followed; "Paintings of Renoir," 1973 and "Paintings by Monet," 1975.  In 1977, while dining in a Chicago restaurant, he choked on food and died at age 60.

Home Country:  United States

HBiography:  [obituary:] "John Maxon, 60, Official of Chicago Art Institute."  New York Times May 26, 1977, p. 34

HBibliography:  [dissertation]  The Early Tintoretto.  Harvard University, 1948; and  Rishel, Joseph J. Painting in Italy in the Eighteenth Century: Rococo to Romanticism. Chicago:  Art Institute of Chicago,1970; Bronzes of India and Greater India.  Providence, RI:  Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art, 1955; and Cunningham, Charles C., and Stam, Diedre.  Rembrandt After Three Hundred Years: a Symposium, Rembrandt and his Followers.  Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1973; Major Works from the Collection of Nathan Cummings.  Chicago: the Art Institute of Chicago, 1973; and Mayer-Thurman, Christa C., and Kavanagh, Aidan, and  Garfield, Donald L., and Allen, Horace T.  Raiment for the Lord's Service: a Thousand Years of Western Vestments.  Chicago: Art Institute, 1975; and Keefe, John W., and Wise, Susan.  Collected Works of 18th Century French Art in the Collections of The Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago: Art Institute, 1976; and Wise, Susan, and Masson, André, and Seiberling, Grace, and Marandel, J. Patrice.  Paintings by Monet. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1975; Paintings by Renoir. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1973; French Master Drawings from Claude to Corot. Providence, RI: Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art, 1954.

“Elder ignored the invitation but remained on good terms with Mr. Turk who later went on to become the Director of the San Diego Museum of Art and ultimately an accomplished artist on his own right.”

Rudy Turk

In the December 1965 issue of San Diego Magazine Marilyn Hagberg wrote this article:     "Things are jumping in all directions at the Fine Arts Gallery in Balboa Park, and far from least of the people cracking the whip is the galloping gallery's new assistant director, Rudy Turk. Although matters were moving in the old building and the almost complete new west wing before he came to San Diego from Richmond, California in July, this energetic, enthusiastic young man can take credit for a lot of the pep that's been making the place pop for the past few months…     His mere presence had created excitement in several quarters already. Gallery director Warren Beach is obviously pleased with his new assistant… 'I was unable even to begin many of the things I should be doing because of the fast-growing complexities of our program.

With Rudy we can now achieve many of the goals we could only dream of previously,' he said. Many outside the gallery are also happy about the new man. The area artists, those of the San Diego Art Guild and otherwise, aware of his reputation as an able administrator and a spirited champion of contemporary art, are rallying behind him…     But as well as praise and enthusiasm, there is some skepticism among local artists. Considering the predominantly conservative exhibition programs of the gallery in the past and the negative responses of some of the public to its more 'modern' shows, they wonder if Rudy might have been hired 'on false pretenses' and if he will wind up having his wings clipped, or worse, by the Fine Arts Society Board. I don't think they need to brood about this: Rudy has no intention of getting his wings clipped, and I doubt if anyone will want to clip them-especially not Warren Beach, who knew exactly what he was doing when he hired him…     Warren Beach is perhaps the man most underrated by the San Diego art community-but not by Rudy Turk, who says: 'We work together beautifully.' He turned down better paying offers from several other art institutions to come to San Diego. 'One of the reasons I chose the Fine Arts Gallery was so I could work with Warren Beach,' he said. 'He has tremendous know-how, and he's always a gentleman. He probably is more responsible than anyone else for the growth of the Fine Arts Gallery and the many developments that are just beginning to bear fruit.'…     Exhibition information is another part of the new assistant's educational plan. Because he believes it's important for gallery-goers to know what they are looking at from both historical and artistic standpoints, he has started the practice of putting placards in English and Spanish on the walls to inform visitors of individual shows….    

Bacon, Francis28 October 1909 – 28 April 1992

Francis Bacon is perhaps Briton’s greatest and most powerful twentieth Century painter. Bacon's reputation has steadily grown despite Margaret Thatcher having famously described him as "that man who paints those dreadful pictures", he was the subject of two major Tate retrospectives during his lifetime and received a third in 2008. His best paintings sell for many tens of millions of dollars.

John Rewald (May 12, 1912 – February 2, 1994) was an American academic, author and art historian. He was known as a scholar of Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, Cézanne, Renoir, Pissarro, Seurat, and other French painters of the late 19th century. He was recognized as a foremost authority on late 19th-century art. His History of Impressionism is a standard work.

Selz, Peter H[oward]

Peter Selz is an important and well-known figure in the art world thanks to major contributions in art history, university teaching, as a tireless curator and as the founder of the Berkeley Art Museum.

Art historian of German Expressionism and Professor of Art History, University of California, Berkeley,1965-1988.  Selz was the son of Eugene Selz and Edith Drey (Selz).   Of Jewish parentage, he fled Nazi Germany with his family arriving in the United States in 1936.  Selz attended Columbia University for the 1937-38 year.  He also established a connection with Alfred Stieglitz, a distant relative, who introduced him to many New York and European expatriate artists. During World War II, he served in the U.S. Army in Office of Strategic Services from 1941 until 1946. He became a naturalized citizen in 1942.  After the War, he married the writer Thalia Cheronis (b. 1925) in 1948.  He attended the University of Chicago, where he received his A. M., in 1949.  Awarded a Fulbright grant for University of Paris and Ecole de Louvre, he spent a year in Paris, 1949-50.  Returning to Chicago, he taught as an instructor while completing his Ph.D. on a topic suggested by the department chair, Ulrich Middeldorf (q.v.) German Expressionism.  A second Fulbright grant was awarded to him to study at the Musées Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire in 1953. His dissertation on German Expressionism, written under Joshua Taylor (q.v.) in 1954, was one of the first from an English-language institution. During these same years he headed the education department at  Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, (to 1955).  In 1955 he moved to Pomona College, Claremont, CA, to chair the art department and be director of the art gallery. 

Selz became the curator of department of painting and sculpture exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art, New York in 1958.  At the Modern, his exhibitions included the infamous1960 Jean Tinguely "Homage to New York," a sculpture that destroyed itself (and started a fire) in the sculpture garden of the Museum. He also launched important retrospectives, including the first Rodin retrospective in the United States and a comprehensive exhibition of Alberto Giacometti’s work in 1965. That year he was called to University of California, Berkeley to found that university's art museum.  He was first director 1965-1973, concomitantly teaching as professor of art history, 1965-1988. He divorced his first wife in 1965. 

Selz was awarded the Order of Merit from Federal Republic of Germany in 1967 for his study of German Expressionism. Together with his mentor, Taylor, and his colleague at Berkeley, Herschel Chipp (q.v.), he co-edited the first collected essays on American primary source theories of modern art in 1968. He taught as Zaks Professor, Hebrew University in Jerusalem in 1976.  In 1983 he married Carole Schemmerling. He was a visiting professor at the City University of New York in 1987.  In 1988 he became emeritus at Berkeley.  He was appointed a member of the advisory council of the Archives of American Art in 1971. For the 1972-73 year he was a senior fellow, National Endowment for the Humanities. From 1993 he served on the acquisitions committee, Museums of Fine Arts, San Francisco.   He served as a member of board of directors for the College Art Association 1958-64, and again in 1966-71.

Hartt, Frederick 1914 ( Boston, MA) – 1991 (Washington, DC )

University of Virginia professor and Michelangelo and Italian Renaissance scholar.  Hart was raised in Boston, the son of Rollin Lynde Hartt and Jessie Clark Knight (Hartt).  He received his B.A. from Columbia University in 1935.  After spending a year at the Institute of Advanced

Study, Princeton, under Erwin Panofsky, 1935-1936, he took his M.A. from New York University in 1937.  Between 1939 to 1941 Hartt was an instructor in the history of art at Bennett Junior College in Millbrook, New York and then an assistant and cataloger at the Yale Art Gallery (1941-1942).  During World War II, he employed his knowledge of the Mediterranean as a photo interpreter, rank of first lieutenant, in the US Army Air Force, 1942-1946.  As the war concluded, he helped repatriate art stored for safekeeping in villas in Italy as part of the so-called "Monuments Men" division. He later helped identify work looted by the Germans in Austrian monasteries and libraries. For this he won the Bronze Star, subsequently serving on the Board of directors of the American Committee for the Restoration Italian Monuments, 1946-1949.  His war experiences later became his 1949 book, Florentine Art Under Fire. 

In 1946 Hartt returned to academics as a lecturer and acting director of the Art Museum at Smith College.  Between 1948-1949 he was a lecturer on Fine Arts at New York University's Washington Square College.  He joined the art history faculty of Washington University in St. Louis in 1949 (to 1960).  In 1950 he completed his dissertation, also from NYU, on Giulio Roman and the Palazzo del Te, written under Walter Friedländer and Richard Offner. In 1960, he moved to The University of Pennsylvania.  He chaired the department there for the next five years, remaining there until 1967.  When the Arno River flooded in Florence in 1966, damaging many works of art, Hartt was again summoned to evaluate and prioritize restoration efforts. He served for the rest of his life on the Committee to Rescue Italian Art.   In 1967, he accepted the Paul Goodloe McIntire Professorship of the History of Art at the University of Virginia, remaining there for the remainder of his career.  He was Chair of the UVA Department of Art, 1967-1976 and became emeritus faculty in 1984. 

Hartt also held visiting professorships at Harvard, Franklin and Marshall College and Baylor University, as well as being a consultant at the J. Paul Getty Center for the History of Art and Culture.  He served on the boards of directors of the College Art Association of America and the American Committee for the Restoration of Italian Art. He died in a Washington, DC hospital of a heart ailment.

Hartt is perhaps best known among non-art scholars for his textbook survey of Renaissance art.  He first published The History of Italian Renaissance Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture in 1969.  Like the History of Art textbook by H. W. Janson after which it was modeled, it presented major renaissance monuments and movements in a fashion compatible for classroom teaching.  Revised numerous times, it has remained a staple of the introduction-to-renaissance-art class.  Hartt also authored a general text on art history.  His reputation as an art expert also put him at the fore of a number of art controversies. 

THE MULDOON ELDER FILM “BRIGHT TEMPEST”HAS BEEN AWARDED

ELEVEN INTERNATIONAL FILM AWARDS

GOLD MEDAL - IFPA CINDY AWARD NOVEMBER, 1973

HIGHEST 1973 AWARD FROM INFORMATION FILM PRODUCERS OF AMERICA

FIRST PRIZE – AMERICAN FILM FESTIVAL 1973

THE NINETEENTH CORK INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL GRAND AWARD 1974 CORK, IRELAND LORD MAYOR, PAT KERRIGAN DIRECTOR, ANDREW DE SREEN

SILVER MEDAL: INTERNATIONAL FILM AND TV FESTIVAL OF NEW YORK 1974

WINNER, BEST SHORT FILM – CHICAGO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 1974

An Improved New “BRIGHT TEMPEST” Cut Made in 1975

GOLD MEDAL: INTERNATIONAL FILM AND TV FESTIVAL OF NEW YORK 1975

GOLD MEDAL: THE FIRST PSYCHEDELIC INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, N.Y.JUROR – THE FAMED ANTHROPOLOGIST, MARGARET MEAD 1975

SILVER MEDAL: CITTA DI ASOLO – PROVINCIA DI TYREVISO 3RD FESTIVAL INTERNAZIONALE DEL FILM SULL’ARTE E BIOGRAFIE D’ARTISTI. 1975

GOLD MEDAL – DOCUMENTARY ARTS ~ 7TH ATLANTA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 1975

THE CHRIS PLAQUE 24TH ANNUAL COLUMBUS FILM FESTIVAL 1976

THE MULDOON ELDER FILM “THE MAGIC MACHINES” AWARDS

ACADEMY AWARD ~ BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT 1969

CANNES FILM FESTIVAL ~ BEST SHORT FILM JURY PRIZE 1970

Between 2005 and 2012, Elder found himself moving idiosyncratically back and forth between creating sometimes expressionistic and sometimes geometrical paintings and drawings. Four recent works are reproduced below.

“King Henry VIII in the Opera, Anna Bolena” Oil on Belgian Linen by Muldoon Elder 671/2 x 55 inches (172 x 140 cm.) 2012

“Portrait of Michael Dunev as a Rather Complex Individual”

pencil and ink drawing on heavy paper by Muldoon Elder 23 x 18 inches (59 x 46 cm.) 2009

“Red Shoes” (detail) oil on Belgian linen by Muldoon Elder 2008 - 2011 full painting below: 49 x 86 inches

Dying Minstrel I V (DETAIL) Full Size: 66 x 102 inches (168 x 259 cm.) Oil on Belgian linen

The Black Tulip Gallery*Alexander Mark Troup says the Troup family involvement in art began about 1958, when his father began collecting Pre-Columbian art. About that same time, the elder Troup had met a man named Rascious, whom Alex said was "a smuggler who lived near Midway Road and gave giant 50s parties."

Mr. Rascious knew the Rockefellers, often visited Mexico, Peru and other South American countries. He was, said Alex, "a clever man who hung out with the beautiful people, had a second hull on his boat," and brought back many forbidden treasures for himself and the beautiful people. His gallery, The Black Tulip in the affluent Inwood shopping center, was the chic abstract art place in Dallas.

ARTFORUM MAGAZINE: ELDER, Muldoon Exhibition at Vorpal Gal (San Francisco), group. HG [Helen Giambruni]. II:1, 11 July 1963 illustration: Elder’s “Suspended Dancer.”

Exhibition at Vorpal Gal (San Francisco), group. PDF [Palmer D. French]. II:9, 53 March 1964

Further Elder Paintings and Drawings: http://www.emptymirrorbooks.com/thirdpage/pullMindex.html