Artist Dan Abramson Biography
Dan Abramson (1932–2012) was an ‘outside-in’ artist whose uncompromising five-decade career spanned from New York City to Los Angeles and multiple disciplines. Self-taught and fiercely independent, Abramson refused categorization, moving fluidly between abstract painting, assemblage, photography, design, and literature. He exhibited in documented group exhibitions during the 1960s New York period, and was included in contemporaneous publications addressing the American art scene.
Abramson’s career began in earnest in New York City in 1961, when his first solo exhibition opened within a year of his arrival from San Diego, a neophyte who had never set foot in a museum. While working by day as a Madison Avenue ad writer with Doyle Dane Bernbach, he built a second life as a prolific visual artist and street photographer. He participated in major group shows through the mid-1960s, including the New York State Council on the Arts exhibition Art Today 1967 with Warhol, Rauschenberg, Lichtenstein, and Oldenburg, and published critical writing on artists such as Willem de Kooning. Then, in 1967, he abruptly withdrew from the art world.
His oeuvre shifted to life as a country bumpkin in Woodstock, NY, from the late 60s through the 70s, where he rebuilt a farmhouse, hewed objects from the surrounding pine forests, and became a noteworthy maker of custom fishing rods and trout flies. Then he pivoted to Los Angeles as a prolific author of novels, screenplays, plays, and short fiction.
It wasn’t until the late 1980s that Abramson reemerged as a visual artist in Los Angeles. Reinvigorated by his move into a dilapidated Silver Lake home he named Casa Effie, he began creating functional art from salvaged materials. What started as makeshift furniture evolved into a new phase of assemblage-based fine art. He turned to gallery boxes, consciously engaging the visual language of Joseph Cornell while developing an independent approach to the medium. Next, multi-media works on paper and his favored technique of lost paper collages, returning to assemblage, painting, and illuminated manuscripts of his poetry.
Represented by Louis Stern Fine Arts for over a decade, Abramson exhibited widely throughout California, with solo and group shows at the Riverside Art Museum, Sherry Frumkin Gallery, Sonrisa, and the Gallery of Functional Art. His work became especially prized among collectors in the Los Angeles art and entertainment communities, including the legendary Mo Ostin Collection.
His most celebrated works include the "Oracles" series: 14 sculptural boxes inspired by Greek mythology, and "Pictures at an Exhibition," a suite of 14 mixed media paintings responding to Mussorgsky’s 1874 composition. Deeply influenced by Joseph Cornell, Cy Twombly, and Rauschenberg, Abramson treated art as a process of excavation: "You don’t make art,” he said. “You find it.” His materials were scavenged from dumpsters and disaster zones, yet his assemblages conveyed poetic precision and philosophical depth.
In addition to his visual art, Abramson authored three novels, 26 screenplays and treatments, plays, short fiction, and volumes of poetry. His early advertising work earned industry acclaim, and he remained an astute cultural critic until his death. Abramson maintained meticulous records of his output, archiving slides and provenance details for every work he created, "preparing," as he put it, “for his posthumous career.”
Abramson’s career began in earnest in New York City in 1961, when his first solo exhibition opened within a year of his arrival from San Diego, a neophyte who had never set foot in a museum. While working by day as a Madison Avenue ad writer with Doyle Dane Bernbach, he built a second life as a prolific visual artist and street photographer. He participated in major group shows through the mid-1960s, including the New York State Council on the Arts exhibition Art Today 1967 with Warhol, Rauschenberg, Lichtenstein, and Oldenburg, and published critical writing on artists such as Willem de Kooning. Then, in 1967, he abruptly withdrew from the art world.
His oeuvre shifted to life as a country bumpkin in Woodstock, NY, from the late 60s through the 70s, where he rebuilt a farmhouse, hewed objects from the surrounding pine forests, and became a noteworthy maker of custom fishing rods and trout flies. Then he pivoted to Los Angeles as a prolific author of novels, screenplays, plays, and short fiction.
It wasn’t until the late 1980s that Abramson reemerged as a visual artist in Los Angeles. Reinvigorated by his move into a dilapidated Silver Lake home he named Casa Effie, he began creating functional art from salvaged materials. What started as makeshift furniture evolved into a new phase of assemblage-based fine art. He turned to gallery boxes, consciously engaging the visual language of Joseph Cornell while developing an independent approach to the medium. Next, multi-media works on paper and his favored technique of lost paper collages, returning to assemblage, painting, and illuminated manuscripts of his poetry.
Represented by Louis Stern Fine Arts for over a decade, Abramson exhibited widely throughout California, with solo and group shows at the Riverside Art Museum, Sherry Frumkin Gallery, Sonrisa, and the Gallery of Functional Art. His work became especially prized among collectors in the Los Angeles art and entertainment communities, including the legendary Mo Ostin Collection.
His most celebrated works include the "Oracles" series: 14 sculptural boxes inspired by Greek mythology, and "Pictures at an Exhibition," a suite of 14 mixed media paintings responding to Mussorgsky’s 1874 composition. Deeply influenced by Joseph Cornell, Cy Twombly, and Rauschenberg, Abramson treated art as a process of excavation: "You don’t make art,” he said. “You find it.” His materials were scavenged from dumpsters and disaster zones, yet his assemblages conveyed poetic precision and philosophical depth.
In addition to his visual art, Abramson authored three novels, 26 screenplays and treatments, plays, short fiction, and volumes of poetry. His early advertising work earned industry acclaim, and he remained an astute cultural critic until his death. Abramson maintained meticulous records of his output, archiving slides and provenance details for every work he created, "preparing," as he put it, “for his posthumous career.”