Graham Harmon, Offspring, 1960

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Graham Harmon; black and white abstract, Offspring c. 1960. Signed and titled lower margin. Mixed media on artist panel; presented … Read more Graham Harmon; black and white abstract, Offspring c. 1960. Signed and titled lower margin. Mixed media on artist panel; presented in a contemporary Italian dark wood frame.

Graham Harmon ( 1928-99 ) New York / Texas

Day Laborer Genius

Orphaned at age 16, Graham Harmon moved from his native New York to rural Texas after his Mother passed to live with his Aunt Laura, his Father, an alcoholic, was unable to care for him.

Graham Harmon himself died of alcoholism in 1999, but not before he would create and leave behind a body of work that included over 5,000 sketches, drawings, and abstract paintings. For 35 years ( from 1947-82 ) he worked to refine recurring themes: still life, abstracts, color fields, landscapes, and seascapes. To pay the bills he moved to different towns in Texas working as a day laborer in the oil fields, a crewman with a geological survey team and a sign painter. At night...he painted.

In his most prolific and important period ( 1958-1972 ) we see influences of his contemporaries Franz Kline, Hans Hoffman, Mark Rothko, and Robert Motherwell. His work seethes with a kinetic fury tracing the character of a man in a hurry; a man being chased to his inevitable end.

I find the rising or setting sun that is depicted in a majority of his paintings very peaceful a calmness in the fury a symbolism of hope. We will never know what it meant to him, but we have preserved his legacy and feel it is beautiful like the rising or setting sun. See less