biografia di Steve WHEELER (1912-1992)

Birth place: Czechoslovakia

Death place: NYC

Addresses: Western PA mining town, 1913; NYC, 1932-on

Profession: Abstract painter

Studied: AIC, 1931; ASL, 1932-36, with Miller, Sternberg, Brooks, DuMond, Grosz, and Vytlacil; Hans Hoffman Sch., 1936-38

Exhibited: Bessamer Gal., Pittsburgh, 1939 (solo); Pinacotecha Gal., NYC, 1942 (solo); Milwaukee AI, 1943; WMAA, 1943-47, 1949; Ferargil Gal., NYC, 1944 (solo); MMA, 1942; Univ. Illinois, 1944; St. Louis AM, 1944; PAFA Ann., 1944; Minnesota AI, 1945; AIC, 1943-46, 1947-48; New Art Circle, 1942, 1946-47; Newhouse Gal., NYC, 1945; Cincinnati AM, 1946; Santa Barbara Mus., 1948; Brooklyn Mus., 1947-51 (purchase prize for print, 1949); Richmond (VA) Mus.; AFA traveling exhibs., 1947-51; New Gal., NYC, 1951 (solo); Town Gal., NYC, 1954 (solo); Baruch College, 1991 ("Indian Space Painters"); Snyder FA, NYC, 1992, 1994, 1997 (solos); Montclair AM, 1997 (retrospective); R. York Gal., 1998, 2001.

Work: Addison Gal. Am. Art; WMAA; Cranbrook MA; Brooklyn Mus.; MMA

Comments: In the midst of the Abstract Expressionist movement, he developed a unique style of abstraction that extracted elements of cubism and combined the playful images of Paul Klee with the pictographic images and space of the Indians of the Northwest Coast, the Southwest, and Peru. His work influenced a group of the 1940s known as the "Indian Space Painters" and their movement was sometimes referred to as "Semiology." Independent and difficult, he withdrew from exhibiting after the 1950s. Teaching: Cooper Union, 1946-55 & Alfred Univ., 1949.

Sources: exh. cat., Snyder FA (NYC, 1994 ); exh. review in New York Times (Oct. 19, 1997, p.39); American Abstract Art, 203; Falk, Exh. Record Series.