OPEN ONLY TO MEMBERS OF THE COMMUNITY ASSOCIATES

The Elephant in the Basement
Friday, November 14, 2008, at 11:00 a.m.
Rubloff Auditorium, The Art Institute of Chicago
Tickets: $15

Artist John Himmelfarb looks back over 40 years of work and the primary sources that shaped its form and content.

"John's work is based on a curious amalgam of postwar expressionism and surrealism. He is strongly influenced, for example, by both the abstractionism of Jackson Pollock with its emphasis on overall gesture and markmaking, and the art brut expressionism of Jean DuBuffet, with its use of childlike imagery to suggest directness and spontaneity. The fact is that John has drawn upon a number of influences from 20th-century art history, but he has managed to move beyond these influences to develop his own powerful and personal voice."—Helen Sheridan, Director, Collections and Exhibitions, Meetings in the Garden: The Art of John Himmelfarb, Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, 1989.

_{John Himmelfarb. Mixed Message, 1994. Restricted gift of Joseph R. Shaprio.}