Ferus Gallery – the artists, curators, and exhibitions – its history

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Ferus Gallery storefront

Exterior view of the Ferus Gallery during the exhibition of Edward Kienholz’s installation Roxy’s, 1962.
Photo by William Claxton (1927–2008). Courtesy Demont Photo Management, LLC. Getty Archive.

Ferus Gallery

The exhibition
‘Objects on the New Landscape Demanding of the Eye’, March 15 – April 11, 1957
was the inaugural group show at the famous Ferus Gallery.
Frank Lobdell, Jay DeFeo, Sonia Gechtoff, Craig Kauffman, Richard Diebenkorn, John Altoon and Clyfford Still were the artists in this show,
directed by curator Walter Hopps, and the artist Edward Kienholz.
In 1958, Edward Kienholz left Ferus Gallery to concentrate on producing art, and his stake in the gallery was replaced by Irving Blum.
Walter Hopps left in 1962 to become curator and, later, director of the Pasadena Art Museum, today Norton Simon Museum.

Exhibition History Timeline

Exhibition Link artist-info.com Ferus Gallery exhibition timeline
Which artists were shown between 1957 – 1966, the years the gallery was active?
How was the gallery and the artists connected with other venues of the time?

Find out more on our exhibition history timeline for Ferus Gallery on artist-info.com.

The details above are showing that Ferus Gallery was important in many aspects. We therefore wanted to add as many exhibitions and their artists as possible to artist-info database.
With the help of Research Library, Getty Research Institute, and through our own research we were able to add 56 exhibitions, solo shows and group shows, displayed on Ferus Gallery artist-info page. Exhibition Link
Going to the artist’s individual artist-info pages shows their later success. Their exhibition history reveals, how galleries, musuems, and other venues like documenta did follow the rumor about these artists and their exciting new art work.

Ferus Gallery started in 1957 at 736-A North La Cienega Boulevard, Los Angeles, California and moved in 1958 to 723 North across the street.
Under the directorship of Irving Blum from 1958, the gallery exhibited both the West Coast and New York art of the period.
It was the first gallery on the West Coast to devote a solo show to Andy Warhol, whom Blum had first met in New York in 1961. Blum also ventured to show other East Coast artists, including Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, and Frank Stella.

Los Angeles artists who had their first solo shows at the gallery included: Sonia Gechtoff 1957 with the gallerie’s first solo show, Wallace Berman (1957), Billy al Bengston (1958), Ed Moses (1958), Robert Irwin (1959), John Mason (1959), Kenneth Price (1960), Llyn Foulkes (1962), Larry Bell (1962) and Ed Ruscha (1963).

These details and the shown artists, then at the beginning of their career, becoming famous in the following years, let Ferus Gallery emerge as an important hot spot for contemporary art on the West Coast in the late 50s until the mid 60s.
Please go to Ferus Gallery artist-info page to find out more about the artists and the related exhibition places, for example the Norton Simon Museum (once Pasadena Art Museum).

Ferus Gallery - artist-info.com Summary
Ferus Gallery – artist-info.com Summary
Find the exhibition timeline from 1957 to 1967 on the artist-info Ferus Gallery page
All artists in the listed solo- and group-exhibitions 1957-1967 of Ferus Gallery.
Josef Albers (1888 - 1976)John Mason (*1927)
John Altoon (1925 - 1969)Lee [Elizabeth] Miller [Lady Penrose] (1907 - 1977)
Larry Bell (*1939)Joan Mitchell (1925 - 1992)
Billy Al Bengston (*1934)Giorgio Morandi (1890 - 1964)
Wallace Berman (1926 - 1976)Ed [Edward Branco] Moses (1926 - 2018)
Streeter Blair (1888 - 1966)Robert Motherwell (1915 - 1991)
James D. Brooks (1906 - 1992)Louise Nevelson (1899 - 1988)
Bruce Conner (1933 - 2008)Barnett Newman (1905 - 1970)
Joseph Cornell (1903 - 1972)David Park (1911 - 1960)
Jay DeFeo (1929 - 1989)Richard Pettibone (*1938)
Richard Diebenkorn (1922 - 1993)Jackson Pollock (1912 - 1956)
Llyn Foulkes (*1934)Larry Poons (*1937)
Sonia Gechtoff (*1926)Kenneth Price (1935 - 2012)
Arshile [Vosdanig Manoog] Gorky (1904 - 1948)Robert Rauschenberg (1925 - 2008)
Philip Guston (1913 - 1980)Milton Resnick (1917 - 2004)
Hans Hofmann (1880 - 1966)Philip Rich (1935 - 2017)
Robert Irwin (*1928)Arthur Richer (*1928)
Jasper Johns (*1930)Mark Rothko (1903 - 1970)
Craig Kauffman (1932 - 2010)Richards Ruben (1925 - 1998)
Ellsworth Kelly (1923 - 2015)Edward Ruscha (*1937)
Edward Kienholz (1927 - 1994)Kurt Schwitters (1887 - 1948)
Franz Kline (1910 - 1962)Frank Stella (*1936)
Willem de Kooning (1904 - 1997)Clyfford Still (1904 - 1980)
Roy Lichtenstein (1923 - 1997)Jack Tworkov (1900 - 1982)
Frank Lobdell (1921 - 2013)Andy Warhol (1928 - 1987)
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