The Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in cooperation with Corbett vs. Dempsey presents a retrospective exhibit of Chicago abstract painter Morris Barazani. The exhibit features a selection of oil paintings, collages and drawings from 1948 to 2014. Each decade is represented with multiple works and the exhibition invites us to take a journey through the artist’s creative life.

Morris Barazani (b.1924) lives in Chicago, where he has been part of the city’s modernist community since the late 1940s. He was originally drawn from Michigan to Chicago by the Constructivist teachings of the Institute of Design (New Bauhaus). In 1948, Barazani attended Cranbrook Academy, outside Detroit. He returned to Chicago where he began to experiment with Abstract Expressionism, which generally went against the grain in a city that honored surrealism and figuration. Equally adept at hard-edged geometry and more organic modes of brushwork, Barazani established himself as one of the most forceful abstract painters in the midwest, synthesizing various influences into an unmistakable personal style. Over the last three decades, Barazani has returned to the landscape as a resource, incorporating the hills of Southwest Wisconsin into his canvases. He founded the art department at DePaul University, and in 1969 was invited to serve as director of the School of Art and Design at University of Illinois at Chicago, Circle Campus.

A full-color catalog with an essay by Doug Stapleton, Assistant Curator of Art with the Illinois State Museum Chicago Gallery, accompanies the exhibition.

More information here.

Image: Morris Barazani, Pinwheel, 2009-10, oil on canvas, 66 1/4 x 56 3/8 inches. Photography by Tom Van Eynde.