The story of twentieth-century American art, particularly
the emergence of the New York School, holds a special place
for artist and art-world impresario John D. Graham. An eccentric
of aristocratic bearing, he cloaked many of the details of
his early life in colorful mythology of his own creation,
but we know that he was born Ivan Gratianovich Dombrovski
in Kiev. He served as a cavalry officer in the czar’s
army during World War One, escaped to Poland, and later France,
when the Bolsheviks seized power in 1917, and arrived in
New York in 1920, where he anglicized his name. In the early
1920s Graham received what is believed to be his first formal
art training at the Art Students League, where he briefly
assisted Ashcan School painter John Sloan.
As his early career unfolded throughout the 1920s, Graham
explored a variety of styles. His work in this decade ranges
from energetic, expressive post-Impressionist still lifes
to restrained, monochromatic studies inspired by Picasso.
In 1925 Graham settled in Baltimore for a few years with
his third wife, artist Elinor Gibson. In Baltimore, he
became acquainted with collector Duncan Phillips, who gave
Graham his first solo exhibition at his Washington, D.C.,
gallery in 1929.
Graham maintained his ties to Europe with frequent travel
to Paris. By the 1930s, Graham had gained notoriety in
New York art world circles as an emissary of European modernism,
particularly surrealism. At the same time, exhibitions
of his work at the Zborowski Gallery in Paris enhanced
his credibility and helped advance his artistic career
in the United States. In addition to painting, Graham established
himself as an art connoisseur and collector. Perhaps most
significantly, he helped Vanity Fair editor Frank
Crowninshield build his famed collection of African art,
purchasing many pieces for him in Paris.
In 1937 Graham authored an influential Socratic dialogue
entitled System and Dialectics in Art. Graham’s
book, which expressed his preoccupation with symbolism
and outward manifestations of a primitive subconscious,
attracted the attention and admiration of Jackson Pollock
and other artists who would soon be associated with Abstract
Expressionism. Although Graham himself had already moved
away from abstraction, never to return to it, he was close
to Pollock (whom he introduced to Lee Krasner), Stuart
Davis, Arshile Gorky, David Smith, Willem de Kooning, among
many others. Graham’s influence as an opinion-maker
and passionate advocate for avant-garde art peaked in 1942.
In that year Graham curated a noteworthy group show at
the McMillen Gallery that placed work by Pollock (it was
his first New York exhibition), de Kooning, and Krasner
alongside work by Picasso and Matisse.
By the early 1940s, Graham had turned primarily to portraiture
and self-portraiture, developing an idiosyncratic and allusive
late style more connected to Old Masters like Poussin and
Raphael than to the Abstract Expressionists he counted
among his friends. Graham’s late paintings are characterized
by the crossed eyes and flat presentation of the figures
and by symbolic surface embellishments drawn from astrology,
alchemy, and the occult.
Graham died in London in 1961 after several restless years
of travel and ill health. Today, his work can be found
in many public collections, including the Whitney Museum
of American Art, New York, and the Phillips Collection,
Washington, D.C. The recent “John Graham: Renaissance & Revolution” show
at the Richard York Gallery was the artist’s first
solo exhibition in 15 years. Renewed interest in Graham’s
work and his prominent role in the rise of the New York
School in the 1930s and 40s continues to build, as indicated
by a second show, “John Graham: Sum Qui Sum,” at
the Allan Stone Gallery in late 2005.
© Copyright 2007 Hollis Taggart Galleries
