News - The Jay DeFeo Foundation

NEWS

Jay DeFeo, Untitled (Shoetree series), 1977

news

November 13, 2020

Gagosian Quarterly – JAY DEFEO’S TRANSCENDENT OBJECTS

Gagosian Quarterly, November 12, 2020, "Jay DeFeo’s Transcendent Objects" By Alice Godwin

Carly

Love0

Jay DeFeo, Untitled, c. 1962-71

news

November 13, 2020

Jay DeFeo in The Brooklyn Rail

The Brooklyn Rail, November 11, 2020, "Orbits of Known and Unknown Objects: SFAI Histories /…

Carly

Love0

Jay DeFeo, Lotus Eater No. 1, 1974

news

November 13, 2020

Jay DeFeo’s Generation: A Conversation hosted by Gagosian

Join Gagosian for a conversation on Jay DeFeo, November 17, 2020, 11AM PST

Carly

Love0

Jay DeFeo, Untitled, 1971

news

November 2, 2020

Catching Ideas in Process: Jay DeFeo’s Photography

CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts is hosting a panel discussion, November 18, 2020, 5:00…

Carly

Love0

Jay DeFeo, Trap, 1972

news

October 16, 2020

Jay DeFeo in SF Chronicle

SF Chronicle, Datebook, October 16, 2020, "Jay DeFeo’s artwork defied labels, which is why it’s…

Carly

Love0

Gagosian Transcending Definition: Jay DeFeo in the 1970s installation view

news

October 16, 2020

Jay DeFeo in Musée Magazine

Musée Magazine, October 15, 2020, "JAY DEFEO: TRANSCENDING DEFINITION" By Alessandra Schade

Carly

Love0

Jay DeFeo, Untitled, c. 1965

news

October 7, 2020

Orbits of Known & Unknown Objects: SFAI Histories/MATRIX 277

The UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA) and the San Francisco Art…

Carly

Love0

Jay DeFeo, The Verónica, 1957

news

October 5, 2020

The Verónica on SFMOMA’s Open Space

We have been thinking about DeFeo's The Verónica. Those who may have missed these musings…

Carly

Love0

Jay DeFeo, Untitled, 1971

news

October 1, 2020

8-bridges Launched

8-bridges, a new online initiative created to highlight artists and galleries in the San Francisco…

Carly

Love0

« Previous 1 2 3 4 Next »

INSTAGRAM

"For an artist absorbed with themes of vision and

"For an artist absorbed with themes of vision and the apparatus of sight, it seems natural that DeFeo would zero in on her swimming goggles as 'an object of observation,' photographing two pairs and making drawings of them in 1977. Her attention to surface and light is evident in the way she captured the translucency and reflectivity of the plastic lenses as well as the deep matte black of the teardrop-shaped padding."

-Dana Miller, “Jay DeFeo: A Slow Curve,” Jay DeFeo: A Retrospective exh. cat. (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art; New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), p. 39-40.

[1/3: Jay DeFeo, Untitled ("Water Goggles" series), 1977, Acrylic, graphite and charcoal on paper, 15 x 20 inches (38.1 x 50.8 cm), Whitney Museum of American Art; 2/3: Jay DeFeo, Untitled ("Water Goggles" series), 1977, Acrylic, graphite, charcoal and ink on paper, 15 x 20 inches (38.1 x 50.8 cm), Paestum Foundation. Photograph: @bblackwellphoto; 3/3: Jay DeFeo, Water goggles and a fragment of jewelry, 1977. Posthumous digital study reproduction from original negative. © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #watergoggles

In 1977 Jay DeFeo began swimming laps at a local p

In 1977 Jay DeFeo began swimming laps at a local pool in Marin County, California for general health and well-being, an activity she stuck with into the 1980s. She acquired swim goggles and was enchanted with the structure of them, saying years later that “It just happened to be a form that I liked.” A family of drawings, the "Water Goggles" series, was the result. She never did use the goggles for swimming.

- Quote from Jay DeFeo, interview with Sidra Stich, October 9, 1988. © Sidra Stich. Audio recording, Archive of The Jay DeFeo Foundation, Berkeley, CA.

[Images: 1/2: Jay DeFeo, Untitled ("Water Goggles" series), 1977, Acrylic, charcoal and graphite on paper, 15 x 20 inches (38.1 x 50.8 cm), Private collection; 2/2: Jay DeFeo in a swimming pool, Japan, 1984. 35mm slide. Photography by Mary-Ann Milford. © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #watergoggles #swimming

Today we are looking back at “Jay DeFeo: Works o

Today we are looking back at “Jay DeFeo: Works on Paper,” an exhibition that opened in 1990 at the University Art Museum at the University of California, Berkeley (now known as the Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive @bampfa).

Organized by art historian and curator Sidra Stich, DeFeo herself was involved in discussing works for the exhibit, which opened just a few months after DeFeo died. The exhibition highlighted DeFeo’s works on paper throughout her career: large scale, small scale, color, black and white. DeFeo particularly enjoyed working on paper, saying at one point, “Paper is so forgiving. You feel as though you can get a lot of ideas out, whereas canvas you always feel as though it’s got to be the one and only ultimate concept of all time. You don't have to be so precious about it.” [Jay DeFeo, slide lecture at University of California, Santa Cruz, May 10, 1989. Video recording, Archive of The Jay DeFeo Foundation, Berkeley, CA.]

The exhibition traveled from Berkeley to The Menil Collection, Houston, TX; Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach, CA; Fresno Art Museum, Fresno, CA, and Krannert Art Museum, Urbana-Champaign, IL. A catalogue edited by Sidra Stich, with contributions by Brigid Doherty, Michael McClure, and Sidra Stich accompanied the exhibition (89 pages, 57 full-page plates).

[1/4: Jay DeFeo, "Pharaoh" ("One O'clock Jump" series), 1979, Acrylic, charcoal and grease pencil on paper, 40 x 30 inches (101.6 x 76.2 cm); 2/4: Jay DeFeo, Untitled ("Eternal Triangle" series), 1980, Acrylic on paper, image: 28 5/8 x 21 1/2 inches (72.7 x 54.6 cm), sheet: 29 5/8 x 22 1/2 inches (75.2 x 57.2 cm). © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; 3-4/4: Installation view, "Jay DeFeo: Works on Paper" exhibition at the University Art Museum (now Berkeley Art Museum), Berkeley, CA, January 10 - March 11, 1990.]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #bampfa #sidrastich #worksonpaper

Remembering "Jay DeFeo: Selected Works, Past and P

Remembering "Jay DeFeo: Selected Works, Past and Present” which was on view from April 18 - May 12, 1984 at the San Francisco Art Institute.

Forty years ago this month, Jay DeFeo was the recipient of the Adaline Kent Award. This award, funded by the artist Adaline Kent after her death in 1957, was given annually by the San Francisco Art Institute to California artists of exceptional talent. The prize included an exhibition, “Jay DeFeo: Selected Works, Past and Present” about which one art critic wrote:

"DeFeo is an artist with the spirit of a fighter and a poet. This survey exhibition reveals the perseverance with which she has worked through the ebbs and flows of her development, as well as the dedication with which she has kept her inner purposes alive. DeFeo’s work offers metaphoric maps of both her analytic processes and her spontaneous psychic ones. Perhaps the most significant aspects of this art are its ability to hold opposing forces in harmony and its humanistic refusal to succumb to a doctrine of dogmatism."

- Andrea Liss, “Jay DeFeo’s Art: A Continuous Vision,” Artweek, May 5, 1984

[1/3: Jay DeFeo standing beside "Baja" at the Adaline Kent Award Exhibition at the San Francisco Art Institute, 1984. Photographed by Leo Holub; 2/3: Cover of Artweek, May 5, 1984 showing Jay DeFeo’s painting "Baja"; 3/3: Jay DeFeo, "Baja," 1983, Oil and oil pastel with tape on canvas, 96 1/2 x 72 inches (245.1 x 182.9 cm). © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #sanfranciscoartinstitute #adalinekent #andrealiss #artweek

Jay DeFeo is featured in "Seven Famous Postwar Ame

Jay DeFeo is featured in "Seven Famous Postwar American Artists from the Bay Area" by Bridget Quinn for the @nobhillgazette.

"Jay DeFeo (1929–1989) is best known for a single, monumental — some might say monomaniacal — artwork, 'The Rose' (1958–66). Once described by DeFeo as 'a marriage between painting and sculpture,' 'The Rose' is nearly 11 feet high and a foot thick; it weighs over a ton. After some eight years of obsessive reworking, DeFeo only stopped (mostly) when she was evicted from her Fillmore apartment in 1965. Bruce Conner, who filmed the eviction, complete with sawing open a wall to extract 'The Rose,' said there needed to be an 'uncontrolled event to make it stop.' And by it, he meant DeFeo."

Follow the link in bio to read the article in full.

[“The Rose,” by Jay DeFeo, 1958–1966. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #nobhillgazette #bridgetquinn

"According to [Wally] Hedrick, he and DeFeo shared

"According to [Wally] Hedrick, he and DeFeo shared an intense, romantic fascination with mountain climbing and especially with the 1953 Mt. Everest expedition of Sir Edmund Hillary, the first climber to reach the summit and return. Hillary's heroic exploits (along with, perhaps, her memories of Colorado) no doubt stimulated DeFeo's 1955-56 'mountain' series ('The Rose' is painted over a failed one) and continued to inspire her."

- Constance Lewallen, “Mountain Climbing,” Jay DeFeo: Selected Works 1952-1989, exh. cat., (Philadelphia: Moore College of Art and Design, 1996).

"Mountain No. 2" (1955) is currently on view at the @deyoungmuseum, Gallery 013. Follow the link in bio for additional information.

[Jay DeFeo, "Mountain No. 2," 1955, Oil on canvas, 46 x 36 inches (116.8 x 91.4 cm), Collection of Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #wallyhedrick #constancelewallen #deyoungmuseum

On Arbor Day, we are happy to announce the upcomin

On Arbor Day, we are happy to announce the upcoming exhibition “Jay DeFeo: Trees,” opening at the @lagunaartmuseum on September 22, 2024. The exhibit will focus on an intriguing series of 1950s works on the subject along with photographs from the 1970s demonstrating DeFeo’s lifetime interest in trees.

Curated by Laguna Art Museum Curatorial Fellow Rochelle Steiner, the exhibition and catalogue will be part of Laguna Art Museum’s annual Art + Nature initiative.

For more information, follow the link in our bio.

[Jay DeFeo, Untitled (“Tree” series), 1954, Tempera on paper, 15 1/4 x 11 3/4 inches (38.7 x 29.8 cm). © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York]

#arborday #trees #lagunaartmuseum #rochellesteiner @rochelle_steiner #jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation

"Despite all the books on color theory, I am adama

"Despite all the books on color theory, I am adamant about the fact that I think color is of a personal, subjective nature. No rules really can be made except those made by each individual painter."

- Jay DeFeo, “Talking with DeFeo,” by Moira Roth, Artweek, February 8, 1990. Archive of The Jay DeFeo Foundation, Berkeley, CA.

"Summer Image No. 1 (for my mother)" (1983) is currently on view at the @anderson.collection.stanford. Follow the link in bio to learn more.

[Jay DeFeo, "Summer Image No. 1 (for my mother)," 1983, Oil and acrylic on paper, 67 3/4 x 44 3/4 inches (172.1 x 113.7 cm), The Anderson Collection at Stanford University. © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #andersoncollection #stanford

Happy Earth Day from The Jay DeFeo Foundation! [J

Happy Earth Day from The Jay DeFeo Foundation!

[Jay DeFeo, Untitled, 1972, Gelatin silver print, 3 x 4 1/4 inches (7.6 x 10.8 cm). © 2024 The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York]

#jaydefeo #jaydefeofoundation #earthday #earthday2024

See More on Instagram

© 2025 The Jay DeFeo Foundation.

For personal and/or educational use only. Text and images of any works of visual art or any other images contained on this website may not be reproduced, downloaded or modified in any form without the express written permission of The Jay DeFeo Foundation. Nothing contained in this website shall be construed as conferring any license or right to any copyright on this website. All artwork, images, writings, and statements by Jay DeFeo © The Jay DeFeo Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.