Fred Bendheim “A Retrospective On the Theme Of Water”

440 Gallery presents an exhibition by Brooklyn artist, Fred Bendheim: A Retrospective On the Theme Of Water. This will be Bendheim’s second solo show at 440 Gallery and his first retrospective exhibition. The show will include work from 1978 to the present, and will include paintings on canvas as well as the artist’s trademark work, shapings, shaped paintings on wood and pvc board and painted relief sculptures. The works on view will highlight the artist’s career and stylistic journey from early figurative paintings to his more recent abstractions. Water, in it’s many forms, is the unifying theme of the works. The artist has always been fascinated by the symbolic and metaphoric aspect of water and it’s ability to take on any form and color, to change it’s state from liquid to solid, and yet remain water. Works on view will include the 1978 painting, “The Red Wave”, one of the artist’s earliest works, painted in California, and showing the influence of a diverse range of interests from Henri Matisse to Hokusai.

The artist will be giving a talk on the work at 440 Gallery on Saturday, January 30th at 4:40 PM.

Fred Bendheim was born in Phoenix, Arizona in 1956. He has lived and worked in Brooklyn, NY since 1983. As a teen-ager, he apprenticed with the pioneer surrealist painter, Philip Curtis. Fred has had numerous one-person shows and his works are in collections world-wide including: The Museum of Arts & Design, NY; The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; The Montclair Art Museum, The National Gallery of Costa Rica; The Instituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti, Venice, Italy; The Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, The Plotkin Museum, The Brooklyn Public Library, NY; Denise Bibro Fine Art, NY; Jason McCoy Gallery, Bradley International Airport, Los Angeles, CA; The Mayo Center for Humanities, Scottsdale, AZ. His commissions include fountain-sculptures for Frank Lloyd Wright buildings and paintings for the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, among others. His past art has taken the form of large room-sized installations, outdoor billboards with children’s art, sculptures, and fountains made with many materials, as well as mural-sized drawings. He has written articles about art for the British journal The Lancet, and he is on the faculty at the Art Students League and The College of Mt. Saint Vincent in New York City.