BIOGRAPHY
SUSAN WEIL’S MIXED-MEDIA WORKS address the plastic quality of time and space through processes of cutting, crumpling and refiguring her compositions. In allowing the viewer’s eye to contemplate a series of moments and perspectives at once, Weil generously gives an almost omniscient power to the viewer, as well as a sense not of fractured time, but of a more truthful depiction of genuine experience.
Her work is in many major international museum collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York; the Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden; the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England; the J. Paul Getty Museum, Malibu, California; the Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon; and the Asheville Art Museum, Asheville, North Carolina.
Susan Weil with Self Portrait, 2000. Photo by José Betancourt
CHRONOLOGY
The following chronology records significant moments in the artist’s personal and professional life.
Early Life
Born in New York, NY in 1930 to Leonard and Grace Weil. Lives in New Jersey and spends summers at the family’s house on Outer Island, one of the Thimble Islands off the coast of Stony Creek, CT.
Begins high school at Dalton in Manhattan. Weil’s art teacher, Aaron Kurzen, introduces her to blind drawing and encourages her to attend Black Mountain College in North Carolina. They go on to have a lifelong friendship.
1948
After graduating high school, Weil travels to Paris for the summer where she attends the Académie Julian and the Académie de la Grande Chaumière.
Meets Bob Rauschenberg, who is staying at the same pension and attending the same classes in Paris. The two develop a close relationship painting together and visiting museums. Weil informs Rauschenberg about Black Mountain College.
Attends Black Mountain College in the fall and is taught by Josef Albers. Befriends many artists, including Ruth Asawa and Ray Johnson.
1949
Finishes Spring semester at Black Mountain College.
Spends the summer on Outer Island. Weil shows Rauschenberg how to make blueprints (cyanotypes), which she made in childhood.
Moves to New York City and enrolls in the Art Students League. Studies under Morris Kantor and Vaclav Vytlacil.
Weil and Rauschenberg share their thoughts and work with Franz Kline, Jack Tworkov, Elaine and Bill de Kooning and others.
1950
Marries Rauschenberg June 21 on Outer Island.
1951
In April, an article is published in LIFE magazine, Speaking of Pictures… by Wallace Kirkland detailing Weil and Rauschenberg’s blueprint collaboration.
Window display of collaborative blueprints at Bonwit Teller in New York.
A collaborative blueprint is shown in “Abstraction in Photography” at the Museum of Modern Art, organized by Edward Steichen. (May 1 – July 4, 1951)
Weil and Rasuchenberg’s son Christopher is born on July 16.
1952
Weil and Rauschenberg separate.
1953
Weil and Rauschenberg divorce, but remain lifelong friends.
1955
Short Circuit is included in the Stable Gallery Annual, New York, NY.
1956/7
Wants to build a studio in Stony Creek, CT. Dorthea Rockburne introduces Weil to architect Bernard Kirschenbaum. He builds her the first residential geodesic dome.
1958
Marries Kirschenbaum.
1959
Weil and Kirschenbaum’s daughter Sara is born on August 7.
1965
Weil’s first solo exhibition is held at Willoughby Wallace Memorial Library Gallery, (now Keyes Gallery) in Stony Creek, CT.
1967
Makes several works of Walking Figures in Plexiglas.
1968
Included in PLASTIC as Plastic the first major exhibition of plastic fine art, decoration, and architecture. Traveling exhibition: Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; Museum of Contemporary Crafts (Museum of Art and Design), New York, NY (November 23, 1968 – January 12, 1969); Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AR (February 8 – March 30, 1969).
In a New York Times review of the show, Hilton Kramer writes favorably of Weil and two other artists of the 200+ exhibited.
1969
Makes a series of Walking Figure paintings.
1971
Organizes a happening called “Greening” at 112 Greene Street in New York, an alternative, artist-run space co-founded by Weil's friend Gordon Matta-Clark.
Becomes part of the New York Professional Women Artists group, an experimental group of professional women artists who strive to find new ways of showing women's art outside of the traditional gallery structure. Weil was one of twelve members: Alice Baber, June Blum, Sari Dienes, Seena Donneson, Ann Gillen, Dorothy Gillespie, Fay Lansner, Ce Roser, Therese Schwartz, Margot Stewart, and Joyce Weinstein.
1973
From '73 - '75, Weil has several solo exhibitions at 112 Greene Street, starting with “Susan Weil: Horizons”.
1974
Visiting artist at Rauschenberg’s Untitled Press in Captiva, FL. Learns how to make lithographs.
1976
Receives the National Endowment for the Arts.
A member of the first group of artists to occupy Institute for Art and Urban Resources, P.S. 1 (now MoMA PS1) in Long Island City, Queens. Weil stays for two years.
Weil’s installation Night Sound is included in the inaugural exhibition at P.S. 1, “Rooms”.
Weil creates a book with artist and dancer Sylvia Palacios Whitman titled Two Notebooks, printed by Untitled Press.
1977
Receives a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Exhibition at P.S. 1, “Susan Weil and Sylvia Whitman: Exhibition of Works from ‘Two Notebooks’”
Two Notebooks is included in a group show of artist books, “Bookworks” at MoMA.
Solo exhibition at Parsons-Dreyfus Gallery, New York, NY.
Included in the Whitney Counterweight exhibition. Weil’s 10-part paper crumple work Northern Sky is exhibited at Auction 393 in SoHo, one location of several featuring 90 artists’ work in response to the 1977 Whitney Biennial.
Meets Anders Tornberg, a gallerist and art dealer from Lund, Sweden.
1978
Begins to show regularly in Sweden and throughout Scandinavia with Anders Tornberg until his death in 1997.
1980
Weil creates a book of photographs and poems, Bird Songs Heartbeats, published by Kalejdoskop: Ahus, Sweden.
1981
Solo exhibition of paper crumples opens at the Helsinki City Art Museum in Helsinki, Finland.
1984
In May, Weil begins sending daily poems with accompanied drawings to Anders Tornberg in Lund, Sweden. She will continue this practice for decades, creating tens of thousands of poems.
1984-5
Guest artist at Robert Blackburn’s Printmaking Workshop in New York. Weil meets Vincent FitzGerald, a publisher of livres d’artistes, at the Printmaking Workshop.
At the Printmaking Workshop, Weil creates Handbook, a portfolio of 10 intaglio prints published by Anders Tornberg Gallery, Lund, Sweden.
FitzGerald invites Weil and printmaker Marjorie Van Dyke to collaborate on a book. Van Dyke and Weil begin a three-year process of studying and interpreting James Joyce’s Epiphanies in preparation.
1986
Weil begins creating another version of her daily poem and image works to send to FitzGerald.
1987
The Epiphanies is published by Vincent FitzGerald and Company. The work is an edition of 50 and held in many public collections, including Columbia University, Rare Books & Manuscripts, New York, NY; Harvard University, Houghton Library Special Collections, Cambridge, MA; Library of Congress, Rare Books and Special Collections Division, Washington, DC; Lyrik Kabinett Foundation, Munich, Germany; Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, OH; and The Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England.
Weil will make eleven livres d’artistes with FitzGerald and several prints through 2006.
1988
FitzGerald introduces Weil to dancer and choreographer, Danny Buraczeski. Weil creates set designs for his dance company, JAZZDANCE. Many dances incorporating Weil's sets are performed at the Joyce Theater in New York and reviewed in the New York Times.
1989
Solo exhibition “Mind’s Sky” opens at Staatsgalerie moderner Kunst, Haus der Kunst, in Munich, Germany.
1997
Solo exhibition of artist books, "Illuminations: Bookworks of Susan Weil," Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden.
First publication of Weil's daily poem / image works, Enkoppkaffe: Dikter / Teckningar [A Cup of Coffee: Poems / Drawings], with a foreward by Anders Tornberg.
1998
"Susan Weil: Full Circle," Black Mountain Museum + Arts Center, Asheville, NC (March 5 – April 25, 1998); North Dakota Museum of Art, Grand Forks, ND (August 20 – September 27, 1998).
2000
Is represented by Sundaram Tagore Gallery, based in New York, NY.
Exhibits her Configurations works on paper in a group show of international artists, "Wanås 2000," at the Wanås Foundation, Knislinge, Sweden.
2002
The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquires Reflections — Photo Alternatives.
2008-9
Solo exhibition of recent three-dimensional paintings, "Motion Pictures," Sundaram Tagore Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA (2008); Sundaram Tagore Gallery, Hong Kong (2009).
2010
Illustrated monograph, Susan Weil: Moving Pictures, is published by Skira with a foreward by Sundaram Tagore and essays by Weil, Dore Ashton, Olle Granath, and David Weir.
2015
Solo exhibition of poem / image works, "Poemumbles: 30 Years of Susan Weil’s Poem / Images," Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, Asheville, NC.
2015-17
Early drawings from Black Mountain College are included in “Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933-1957” an exhibition organized by Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center. The show travels to The Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston, Boston, MA; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; and the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH.
2016
Solo exhibition of Weil's work on various media related to James Joyce, "James Joyce: Shut Your Eyes and See," University at Buffalo, The Poetry Collection of the University Libraries, Buffalo, NY.
2017
Secrets, a work on paper made during Weil's time at Black Mountain College in 1949, is included in "Robert Rauschenberg: Among Friends" at MoMA. Also on display: Short Circuit from 1955 and multiple collaborative blueprints made with Rauschenberg c.1950.
2021
Solo exhibition at JDJ The Ice House in Garrison, NY is reviewed by Dawn Chan in the New York Times.
BIOGRAPHY
SUSAN WEIL’S MIXED-MEDIA WORKS address the plastic quality of time and space through processes of cutting, crumpling and refiguring her compositions. In allowing the viewer’s eye to contemplate a series of moments and perspectives at once, Weil generously gives an almost omniscient power to the viewer, as well as a sense not of fractured time, but of a more truthful depiction of genuine experience.
Her work is in many major international museum collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York; the Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden; the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England; the J. Paul Getty Museum, Malibu, California; the Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon; and the Asheville Art Museum, Asheville, North Carolina.
Susan Weil with Self Portrait, 2000.
Photo by José Betancourt
CHRONOLOGY
The following chronology records significant moments in the artist’s personal and professional life.
Early Life
Born in New York, NY in 1930 to Leonard and Grace Weil. Lives in New Jersey and spends summers at the family’s house on Outer Island, one of the Thimble Islands off the coast of Stony Creek, CT.
Begins high school at Dalton in Manhattan. Weil’s art teacher, Aaron Kurzen, introduces her to blind drawing and encourages her to attend Black Mountain College in North Carolina. They go on to have a lifelong friendship.
1948
After graduating high school, Weil travels to Paris for the summer where she attends the Académie Julian and the Académie de la Grande Chaumière.
Meets Bob Rauschenberg, who is staying at the same pension and attending the same classes in Paris. The two develop a close relationship painting together and visiting museums. Weil informs Rauschenberg about Black Mountain College.
Attends Black Mountain College in the fall and is taught by Josef Albers. Befriends many artists, including Ruth Asawa and Ray Johnson.
1949
Finishes Spring semester at Black Mountain College.
Spends the summer on Outer Island. Weil shows Rauschenberg how to make blueprints (cyanotypes), which she made in childhood.
Moves to New York City and enrolls in the Art Students League. Studies under Morris Kantor and Vaclav Vytlacil.
Weil and Rauschenberg share their thoughts and work with Franz Kline, Jack Tworkov, Elaine and Bill de Kooning and others.
1950
Marries Rauschenberg June 21 on Outer Island.
1951
In April, an article is published in LIFE magazine, Speaking of Pictures… by Wallace Kirkland detailing Weil and Rauschenberg’s blueprint collaboration.
Window display of collaborative blueprints at Bonwit Teller in New York.
A collaborative blueprint is shown in “Abstraction in Photography” at the Museum of Modern Art, organized by Edward Steichen. (May 1 – July 4, 1951)
Weil and Rasuchenberg’s son Christopher is born on July 16.
1952
Weil and Rauschenberg separate.
1953
Weil and Rauschenberg divorce, but remain lifelong friends.
1955
Short Circuit is included in the Stable Gallery Annual, New York, NY.
1956/7
Wants to build a studio in Stony Creek, CT. Dorthea Rockburne introduces Weil to architect Bernard Kirschenbaum. He builds her the first residential geodesic dome.
1958
Marries Kirschenbaum.
1959
Weil and Kirschenbaum’s daughter Sara is born on August 7.
1965
Weil’s first solo exhibition is held at Willoughby Wallace Memorial Library Gallery, (now Keyes Gallery) in Stony Creek, CT.
1967
Makes several works of Walking Figures on Plexiglas.
1968
Included in PLASTIC as Plastic the first major exhibition of plastic fine art, decoration, and architecture. Traveling exhibition: Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; Museum of Contemporary Crafts (Museum of Art and Design), New York, NY (November 23, 1968 – January 12, 1969); Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AR (February 8 – March 30, 1969).
In a New York Times review of the show, Hilton Kramer writes favorably of Weil and two other artists of the 200+ exhibited.
1969
Makes a series of Walking Figure paintings.
1971
Organizes a happening called “Greening” at 112 Greene Street in New York, an alternative, artist-run space co-founded by Weil's friend Gordon Matta-Clark.
Becomes part of the New York Professional Women Artists group, an experimental group of professional women artists who strive to find new ways of showing women's art outside of the traditional gallery structure. Weil was one of twelve members: Alice Baber, June Blum, Sari Dienes, Seena Donneson, Ann Gillen, Dorothy Gillespie, Fay Lansner, Ce Roser, Therese Schwartz, Margot Stewart, and Joyce Weinstein.
1973
From '73 - '75, Weil has several solo exhibitions at 112 Greene Street, starting with “Susan Weil: Horizons”.
1974
Visiting artist at Rauschenberg’s Untitled Press in Captiva, FL. Learns how to make lithographs.
1976
Receives the National Endowment for the Arts.
A member of the first group of artists to occupy Institute for Art and Urban Resources, P.S. 1 (now MoMA PS1) in Long Island City, Queens. Weil stays for two years.
Weil’s installation Night Sound is included in the inaugural exhibition at P.S. 1, “Rooms”.
Weil creates a book with artist and dancer Sylvia Palacios Whitman titled Two Notebooks, printed by Untitled Press.
1977
Receives a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Exhibition at P.S. 1, “Susan Weil and Sylvia Whitman: Exhibition of Works from ‘Two Notebooks’”
Two Notebooks is included in a group show of artist books, “Bookworks” at MoMA.
Solo exhibition at Parsons-Dreyfus Gallery, New York, NY.
Included in the Whitney Counterweight exhibition. Weil’s 10-part paper crumple work Northern Sky is exhibited at Auction 393 in SoHo, one location of several featuring 90 artists’ work in response to the 1977 Whitney Biennial.
Meets Anders Tornberg, a gallerist and art dealer from Lund, Sweden.
1978
Begins to show regularly in Sweden and throughout Scandinavia with Anders Tornberg until his death in 1997.
1980
Weil creates a book of photographs and poems, Bird Songs Heartbeats, published by Kalejdoskop: Ahus, Sweden.
1981
Solo exhibition of paper crumples opens at the Helsinki City Art Museum in Helsinki, Finland.
1984
In May, Weil begins sending daily poems with accompanied drawings to Anders Tornberg in Lund, Sweden. She will continue this practice for decades, creating tens of thousands of poems.
1984-5
Guest artist at Robert Blackburn’s Printmaking Workshop in New York. Weil meets Vincent FitzGerald, a publisher of livres d’artistes, at the Printmaking Workshop.
At the Printmaking Workshop, Weil creates Handbook, a portfolio of 10 intaglio prints published by Anders Tornberg Gallery, Lund, Sweden.
FitzGerald invites Weil and printmaker Marjorie Van Dyke to collaborate on a book. Van Dyke and Weil begin a three-year process of studying and interpreting James Joyce’s Epiphanies in preparation.
1986
Weil begins creating another version of her daily poem and image works to send to FitzGerald.
1987
The Epiphanies is published by Vincent FitzGerald and Company. The work is an edition of 50 and held in many public collections, including Columbia University, Rare Books & Manuscripts, New York, NY; Harvard University, Houghton Library Special Collections, Cambridge, MA; Library of Congress, Rare Books and Special Collections Division, Washington, DC; Lyrik Kabinett Foundation, Munich, Germany; Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, OH; and The Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England.
Weil will make eleven livres d’artistes with FitzGerald and several prints through 2006.
1988
FitzGerald introduces Weil to dancer and choreographer, Danny Buraczeski. Weil creates set designs for his dance company, JAZZDANCE. Many dances incorporating Weil's sets are performed at the Joyce Theater in New York and reviewed in the New York Times.
1989
Solo exhibition, “Mind’s Sky” opens at Staatsgalerie moderner Kunst, Haus der Kunst, Munich, Germany.
1997
Solo exhibition of artist books, "Illuminations: Bookworks of Susan Weil," Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden.
First publication of Weil's daily poem / image works, Enkoppkaffe: Dikter / Teckningar [A Cup of Coffee: Poems / Drawings], with a foreward by Anders Tornberg.
1998
"Susan Weil: Full Circle," Black Mountain Museum + Arts Center, Asheville, NC (March 5 – April 25, 1998); North Dakota Museum of Art, Grand Forks, ND (August 20 – September 27, 1998).
2000
Is represented by Sundaram Tagore Gallery, based in New York, NY.
Exhibits her Configurations works on paper in a group show of international artists, "Wanås 2000," at the Wanås Foundation, Knislinge, Sweden.
2002
The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquires Reflections — Photo Alternatives
2008-9
Solo exhibition of recent three-dimensional paintings, "Motion Pictures," Sundaram Tagore Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA (2008); Sundaram Tagore Gallery, Hong Kong (2009).
2010
Illustrated monograph, Susan Weil: Moving Pictures, is published by Skira with a foreward by Sundaram Tagore and essays by Weil, Dore Ashton, Olle Granath, and David Weir.
2015
Solo exhibition of poem / image works, "Poemumbles: 30 Years of Susan Weil’s Poem / Images," Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, Asheville, NC.
2015-17
Early drawings from Black Mountain College are included in “Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933-1957” an exhibition organized by Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center. The show travels to The Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston, Boston, MA; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; and the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH.
2016
Solo exhibition of Weil's work on various media related to James Joyce, "James Joyce: Shut Your Eyes and See," University at Buffalo, The Poetry Collection of the University Libraries, Buffalo, NY.
2017
Secrets, a work on paper made during Weil's time at Black Mountain College in 1949, is included in "Robert Rauschenberg: Among Friends" at MoMA. Also on display: Short Circuit from 1955 and multiple collaborative blueprints made with Rauschenberg c.1950.
2021
Solo exhibition at JDJ The Ice House in Garrison, NY is reviewed by Dawn Chan in the New York Times.
