'Geometric Abstract I' by Renee Harwin, Bay Area Abstraction, San Francisco Art Institute

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Signed, verso, on stretcher bar, 'Renee Harwin' (Austrian-American, born 1924) and painted circa 2000.

A substantial, Post-Painterly abstract comprising hard-edged, … Read more Signed, verso, on stretcher bar, 'Renee Harwin' (Austrian-American, born 1924) and painted circa 2000.

A substantial, Post-Painterly abstract comprising hard-edged, geometric forms in primary colors, with ochre and burnt umber, stacked in a vertical composition.

Born in Vienna in 1924, Renee Harwin emigrated to the United States with her family to escape Hitler and the Holocaust. She graduated from San Francisco State University in 1970 and went on to receive her MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1973. Harwin exhibited widely and with success in the California Bay Area, including at the University of California at Davis, the C.N. Gorman Museum (1993) and at the De Young Museum. Her work combines the influence of Midwest painters such as Clyfford Still and her San Francisco Art Institute instructor, Jack Jefferson, with the early influences of Viennese art. Harwin attributes much of her visual language to her architect father and to modern architecture.

Photo of Renee Harwin, 1977.
Courtesy of McHenry Library and the Regents of the University of California See less