“Ohlson’s control of color, arrived at by intuition rather than scientific theory, is always part and parcel with the compositional means he has selected at each stage of his evolution. These developments as outlined here may sound more methodical, more plotted than they actually have been. Neither he nor any other good artist educates himself to produce some final revelation of an earlier vision. Quite oppositely, at each stage the paintings have spoken for themselves on the premises which underlay their making at the time. Yet it is impossible in retrospect not to see that his preoccupations have contributed to an ongoing process and continuity.”
- E.C. Goossen
Excerpt from the essay for the exhibition Doug Ohlson at Bennington: Two Decades, 1962-1982,
Bennington College, VT, 1982
DOUG OHLSON
Born: November 18, 1936; Cherokee, Iowa
Died: June 29, 2010; New York
Solo Exhibitions from the 1980s
1982 Bennington College, Vermont; curated by E.C. Goossen;
“Doug Ohlson at Bennington: Two Decades, 1962-1982”
1985 Andre Zarre Gallery, New York, also 1990-95, 2000, and 2004
Ruth Siegel Ltd, New York
1986 Galerie 99, Bay Harbor Islands, Florida
Nina Freudenheim Gallery, Buffalo, New York
1987 Ruth Siegel Ltd., New York; "Four Painters in New York - Four Solo Exhibitions:
Leon Polk Smith, Doug Ohlson, Katherine Porter, Willy Heeks"
1989 Ann Jaffe Gallery, Bay Harbor Islands, Florida
Selected Group Exhibitions from the 1980s
1980 "Arte Americana Contemporanea", Civici Musei e Gallerie di Storia e Arte, Udine, Italy
1984 "24 x 24 x 24, An invitational exhibition", Ruth Siegel Ltd, New York
1985 "Bilder fur Frankfurt", Museum fur Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany
"The Severe and the Romantic: Geometric Humanism in American Painting,
the 1950's and the 1980's", Marilyn Pearl Gallery, New York
1986 "Harvest", Ruth Siegel Ltd, New York
"Square and . . .", Ruth Siegel Ltd, New York
"Ten Artists", Ruth Siegel Ltd at The International Contemporary Art Fair,
Los Angeles Convention Center, Los Angeles, California
1987 "Review / Preview", Ruth Siegel Ltd, New York
"Color Now", 55 Mercer Street, New York
1988 "20th Anniversary Group Exhibition", Paula Cooper Gallery, New York
1989 "A Debate on Abstraction: The Persistence of Painting,"
The Bertha and Karl Leubsdorf Art Gallery, Hunter College, New York
"Small Paintings", Nina Freudenheim Gallery, Buffalo, New York
Selected Public Collections
Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick
Brooklyn Museum, New York
Dallas Museum of Art, Texas
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The Minneapolis Institute of the Arts, Minnesota
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Museum fur Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany
The National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
The University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City
Utah Museum of Fine Arts, University of Utah, Salt Lake City
Weatherspoon Art Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greensboro
Albright-Knox Gallery, Buffalo, New York
Lowe Art Museum, Miami
Karl Ernst Osthaus-Musuem, Hagen, Germany
Harvard Art Museum, Cambridge
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Palm Springs Art Museum
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art