Fall / Winter 2024
The Master Builder, 2024
Acrylic on Canvas
72 x 60 in
November 22nd, 2024
My wife and I recently returned from a trip to the Basque Country in Spain and France on either side of the Pyrenees. It was a remarkable trip. I had last been in the region when I was twenty and hitchhiking around Europe on my own. There were two highlights from that original trip: one was meeting my now best friend on the beach at Biarritz; the other was running with the bulls in Pamplona. Yes, I did do that. Only later did I learn that it was highly inappropriate because the tradition of the running was that the male who had recently become engaged thereby proved his bravery to his fiancée. Once a large number of blue-jeaned Americans and Australians had joined the run (no doubt thanks to reading Hemingway) it seemed less dangerous and therefore less proof of extreme bravery. I distinctly remember the fear that resulted from these enormous beasts slipping and sliding on the streets as we ran and rolling toward you as you were trapped in a crowd of runners, fearful that a bull would crush you or maim you with his horns. Today I won’t ride a motorcycle or go up in a helicopter (too many moving parts that can go wrong and no chance of gliding to a landing), but when young I was fool enough to run with those bulls. Not only, in retrospect, was that stupid, but at the same time I managed to insult the many Basques and Spaniards who had previously established the run as a test of manhood. Just another example of American innocence.
This trip was different. I am older and wiser. I came away with a vast appreciation for the Basque people. The beauty of the region, the wonder of their food, the charm of their towns and cities left an indelible impression on me. But most of all, their culture and their pride in that culture and their history stood out. They’re tough, descendants of shepherds going back to the Roman Empire and have a long history of insisting on independence from first the Romans and later the central governments of Spain and France. During the Franco Era in Spain they were such a burr in the dictator’s saddle (they largely supported the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War) that he invited Hitler to test his munitions on the Basque capital of Guernica. Most of the men in that city were off at the front fighting Franco’s troops when the German Luftwaffe committed the atrocity memorialized in Picasso’s great painting and bombed Guernica and its women and children to dust. Consider that carefully. The future leader of a nation invited a foreign power to bomb his own people. That’s all you need to know to understand Franco and the dictatorial mind.
In that wonderful Basque region is Bilbao. It was a heavily industrialized city that was dependent upon the mining of iron ore and processing of the same along with the export of wool. When the mines ran out the city fell into decline and looked somewhat like our old factory and mill towns as they declined. But then despite much doubt and over the fierce opposition of a large minority of residents, the city invited the architect Frank Gehry to design a museum to be placed at the core of the city. The result is astonishing. Not only did it lead to a complete revitalization of the city, which is now largely a service economy and contains several absolutely beautiful buildings and a wonderful set of public spaces, but that museum, the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is, in my opinion, one of the great buildings of the Twentieth Century and perhaps the very best of the last quarter of that century. We had been told that while the museum was worth the trip there was little reason to spend much time in it because the art itself was of little interest. That is a misjudgment of the first order. For starters, Richard Serra’s A Matter of Time which consists of a wonderful series of weathering steel sculptures that play games with your sense of balance, space and time, sits in a main gallery. At the front of the museum is Jeff Koon’s famous Puppy and inside is his Tulips. I am hardly a fan of Koons but I have to admit that these two pieces are impressive and beautifully crafted. Also in the museum galleries are some great pop art and while we were there traveling exhibits of Kusama and of Nara.
I cannot end my comments about Gehry’s accomplishment without saying that in some ways it recalled for me Gaudi’s great Sagrada Familia. Both are masterpieces that grew out of particular cultures (Basque and Catalan) within Spain whose members consider themselves “apart” from the rest of the country and have from time-to-time sought secession but have settled for autonomy. Both cultures are boundlessly proud of their heritage, which brings me to some further musings about our recent election and the weeks surrounding it.
We returned to a United States that seems at war with itself, divided into what feels like two nations that speak and look past each other. There seems to be a lot of despair out there, concern that the center cannot hold and that dangers lurk everywhere. But what I see is just another period of flux in a national history that has almost never been stable but has managed to not only survive, but thrive, thanks to the incredible foresight of the Founding Fathers who gave us a Constitution that manages the passions of each era and forces all factions to eventually compromise with others with which they fiercely disagree. When exiting the Constitutional Convention immediately after that document had been completed, Benjamin Franklin was asked by one of the leading female citizens of the day “Have you given us a Republic or a Monarchy?” to which Franklin replied, “A Republic if you can keep it.” Whether we would keep it was in question in the early years of our history when the hatred between the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists was palpable, when we suffered deep depressions in the Nineteenth Century, when a literal civil war broke out over the question of slavery, when the labor movement elicited violence and Progressives and “Big Business” were at each other’s throats, when inequality of incomes prior to the progressive income tax led to radicalization and anarchism, when the Great Depression tore at the belief in government’s ability to serve the people, when many felt that FDR had become a dictator, and on into the disruptions of the 1960’s and 1970’s when an unpopular war and civil rights battles tore at the fabric of the nation. Here in the 21st Century we have had to confront the attempt by a losing candidate for the Presidency to retain power and the deep passions Donald Trump has set loose as he seems to now seek an authoritarian government freed of any constitutional bounds. Thankfully, the Republic HAS survived and I believe it will do so now again. We’re still a young country that has managed its way through storm and strife, one that still attracts massive numbers of hopeful immigrants who have with their feet voted as to where in this world there is still the best opportunity to be found for a person and his or her family to pursue “happiness” however he chooses and to not have to fear that the wrong belief or speech will bring the police to his or her door.
The Basques are deeply proud of their history and culture. Like any people, theirs is not without blemish. So, too, is the history and culture of the United States. But we should be proud as well. The perfect is the enemy of the good. What we have built over 235 years is far from perfect, full of things about which we should be embarrassed, but still awfully good. I’m as proud to be an American as any Basque is of his heritage.
Now on to the “art” part of this letter.
I am delighted to report that both the Bronx Museum in New York and the Institute of Contemporary Art in Miami have acquired paintings of mine to be included in their permanent collections. As you might guess, to have that kind of thing happen so soon after the commencement of a professional artist’s career, is not common. I’m both humbled and delighted. In addition the Bronx Museum has decided to make me one of the honorees at its April 7, 2025 Gala and has asked me to allow them to auction off a second painting for the benefit of the museum, to which I have readily agreed. My earliest years were spent on Walton Avenue, literally across The Grand Concourse from the museum’s location, so having this relationship with this institution is especially meaningful to me. If any of you would be interested in attending that Gala please let me know. It will take place at the Tribeca Rooftop and should be an enjoyable evening. Art galas are almost always way more fun than the usual events of this kind.
On November 12-13 I participated in a wonderful curated group show by Brigitte Mulholland Gallery at 525 West 24th Street in NYC that featured my work along with that of twelve other artists, many of them widely known. I was fortunate enough to have six pieces chosen for inclusion in the show and was also invited to participate in a panel discussion on artist’s studio practices. No one in the audience of over 65 people fell asleep so I judged the panel a success. Among the hundreds of attendees at the show were artists, curators, art advisers, museum personnel, collectors and a number of you. For those who were there, thank you so much for attending. I hope you loved the art. For those of you who were not, below here is the information on the show and some images from the exhibition installation.
”The November exhibition entitled, “L'atelier” was a one day only group exhibition in New York City about the artist's studio and what it means to be an artist. Featuring paintings, sculptures, drawings and photographs - all of the works in the show have an element of self-reflection, memory, autobiography, and musings on the studio itself. The title is loosely derived from the Gustave Courbet painting “L'Atelier du peintre” - a monumental, historic painting that tackles these same ideas.” - Brigitte Mulholland
Only Connect, 2024, Acrylic on Canvas, 60 x 60 in (center)
The Watch, 2024, Acrylic on Canvas, 60 × 48 in (far left)
The Master Builder, 2024, Acrylic on Canvas, 72 × 60 in (far left)
Renaissance, 2019, Acrylic on Canvas, 72 x 60 in (left) & All Square, 2024, Acrylic on Canvas, 20 x 20 in (center right)
My next “stop” on the art circuit will probably be at the Felix Fair in February at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in Los Angeles where I will have a gallery showing a couple of pieces of mine. It’s possible, but unlikely, that I will show at Miami Basel but I don’t plan on it.
I have to end this letter by noting that I went to the fifth and last game of the World Series and saw my beloved Yankees blow a game they should have won to allow the Dodgers to celebrate their championship at Yankee Stadium. It would have been horrible except that my son had flown in from LA to take me to the game and nothing was going to ruin the pleasure of that for me. And here is where I can also bury my early hopes for the New York Football Giants, suffering through yet another miserable season. My only consolation is that they aren’t the Jets. So now I direct my sports passions to the Knicks, players of “the city game” and the one sport that almost every artist in New York seems to love. In fact, there is now an annual ArtBall basketball game in which many artists participate in 3-on-3 games all the way to a championship round with all of the proceeds from attendees and sponsors going to a variety of city charities. It is organized by the NYC Culture Council, a wonderful organization with which I am involved. I endowed The Stillman Prize, an annual juried competition that selects an emerging artist’s submission and purchases a single work of that artist’s to be permanently displayed in the Council’s space in the World Trade Center. This year’s winner is Jason Wallace, a wonderful young man who subsequent to winning that competition was selected to be displayed in the Cooper Hewitt Museum’s Triennial (which was especially rewarding for me since I had been selected for that Triennial in 2006-2007 so now we have an even stronger connection) for a beautiful piece he did.
I hope this letter finds you well and happy (and by now bleary-eyed from reading what must seem like a novel) and I hope to see some of you at various times over the course of the next year. As always, feel free to write to me and I will attempt to answer any correspondence.
Regards,
Abbott Stillman