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ATHANASSIOS ZACHARIAS / dit: ATHOS ZACHARIAS (USA, Massachusetts b. 1927 / act: New York) |
Athos Zacharias was born Athanasios Zacharias on 17 June 1927 in Marlborough, Massachusetts, and was raised in Fall River. He attended The School of Practical Arts, Boston MA and then - on the GI Bill - the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence RI, graduating in 1952. He studied at the Art Students League Summer School, Woodstock NY (1952), and then did a year of post-graduate study at the Cranbook Academy of Art, Bloomfield Hills MI, receiving an MFA in 1953. He has taught classes at leading institutions including Brown University, Providence RI; Cooper Union Extension Division, New Yoprk NY; Parsons School of Design, New York NY; State Univeristy of New York - SUNY, New Paltz NY; Swaine School of Design, New Bedford MA; and for twenty-six years at Wagner College on Staten Island NY. § Zacharias has received awards by the following foundations: Best in Show, Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton NY (1979); Longview Foundation, Washington DC (1962); and Festival of Art, Southampton College, Southampton NY. § Athos Zacharias has exhibited in leading galleries at home and internationally (notably in Amsterdam and Japan). He presented the following personal exhibitions: Museum of Arts and Craft, Providence RI (1953); Brown University, Providence RI (1954); Great Jones Gallery, New York NY (1960); Joachim Gallery, Chicago IL (1961); Mayer Gallery, New York NY (1961); Bob Keene Gallery, Southampton, NY (1962); Louis Alexander Gallery, New York NY (1962, 1963); Guild Hall, East Hampton NY (1965); Elaine Benson Galllery, Bridgehampton, NY (1967, 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1991); Westbeth Galleries, New York NY (1970, 1971); Landmark Gallery, New York NY (1973); Glassboro State College, Glassboro NJ (1976); James Yu Gallery, New York NY (1977); Elaine Benson Gallery, Bridgehampton NY (1978); Fred Dorfman Gallery, New York NY (1978); Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, NY (1979); Zacharias: Abstract Illusionism, Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, New York (1980); Multi-Fired Vessels by Regis Brodie & Painting by Zacharias, Adagio Gallery, Bridgehampton NY (1982?); Elena Prohaska Gallery, New York NY (1983); Zacharias: The Evolution of an Abstract Imaging System, Adagio Gallery, Bridgehampton NY (1983); Bologna Gallery, East Hampton NY (1984, 1985, 1986, 1992, 1993); Benton Gallery, Southampton NY (1986, 1987, 1988); Vered Gallery, East Hampton, NY (1986); Galerie Kwartijn, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (1986); American Academy & Society of Arts and Letter, New York NY (1986); Owl 57, Woodmere NY (1987, 1988); Galerie Kwartijn, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (1987); Mat Gallery, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (1987); Nuance Galleries, Tampa FL (1988); Providence Art Club, Providence, RI (1991); Artra Amsterdam, The Netherlands (1991); Bryant Library, Roslyn NY (1994); Millennium Gallery, East Hampton NY (1994, 1995); Ann Harper Gallery, Amagansett NY (1995); Athos Zacharias, Nabi Gallery, East Hampton NY (1995); Athos Zacharias: Illusion, Elaine Benson Gallery, Bridgehampton NY (1995); Nabi Gallery, East Hampton NY (1997, 1998, 1999); and Athos Zacharias: Summer Invitational Exhibition, OK Harris, New York NY (2005). § Athos Zacharias' artwork can be found in the following institutions: Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; the Museum of Art, Providence RI; Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston MA; Kalamazoo Institute of Art, Kalamazoo, MI;Butler Art Institute, Youngstown OH; E.F. Hutton & Co. NY; and Westinghouse Corporation, Pittsburgh PA. § Athos Zacharias was married to Mary Filaretos, and is the father of two, Rena and Denis. He currently lives in New York City and spends his summer on Long Island. [Megakles 07/2008]Zacharias uses the grid in a totally new way for effects of velocity. His paintings offer a sense of vertiginous motion like a wall of posters seen close-by from the window of a speeding train. Zacharias has been obsessed by the principle of the grid for a decade or more. In 1970 he had finished a group of powerful, immaculate black and white paintings that he refers to as his 'cylinders.' They had the massive presence of vertically rotating industrial forms. In the next few years he altered the weight of his colors, working with pale tonalities, glassy sheets of atmospheric, light-reflecting blues and greys. Now, his palette is heightened, evoking the incandescent, theatrical colors of commercials on TV or the colors of toys, debonair, gay colors that suit the cavorting forms that leap from frame to frame like a sequence in a Fred Astaire film clip. He calls his present work 'Abstract Illusionism,' referring to the chance resemblances in the play of the brushwork, to landscapes, skies, waves, green peppers. Mirage is the relevant title of one of these paintings, a staccato sequence of rectangles in shimmering, orange glazes. Flim-flam, with its flashes of red shadows, witty grace notes, evokes a ballet on TV. One title, Home Movies, might apply to the show as a whole, indicating, as it does, his passionate preoccupation with animation, controlled spontaneity. § Athos Zacharias, as a painter, has serendipity: his colors and forms always charge into the right place at the right time. [Elaine de Kooning - courtesy of the Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, NY]
Synthesizing images from pop culture, architecture, and nature, painter Athos Zacharias creates dynamic works notable for their spontaneity and characterized by Art News as 'blindingly original.' Now the one-time assistant to Willem de Kooning has produced a totally new group of paintings that unite the major ideas of this 'between generational'; painter. § "I am involved in computer manipulations of Pop images assembled into collages and painted on canvas. My images are culled from popular media - magazines most commonly - and my paintings have a surreal tone," Zacharias says. "Still, my subject matter remains rooted in the spatial traditions of modern, abstract painting. Indeed, throughout my career I have had a preoccupation with spatial ambiguity. I would say that this idea - the dynamics of uncertain perception, of positive and negative forms within a restricted depth of space - links my work over the past 40 years." § Arriving in New York in 1956, Zacharias immediately became involved with the downtown art scene. "I encountered some of the artists who would impact my artistic life. During the sixties in New York, I assisted other artists including Larry Rivers, Grace Hartigan, Mary Abbot, Jack Tworkov, Alphonso Ossorio and Lee Krasner, and notably,Willem de Kooning. Another friend and major influence was abstract painter Franz Kline." § Recalling his initial encounter with de Kooning, Zacharias says: "I met Milton Resnick, who invited me to the 'Club' where I attended many panels on Friday nights, and participated on one panel entitled 'Younger Artists.' Shortly thereafter, I met de Kooning and a friendship blossomed. I was fortunate to be his first assistant when his studio was on Tenth Street. He so strongly believed in my work that he sponsored me for the Longview Foundation Award in 1962. I began to exhibit at the local Guild Hall where in 1961, and again in 1979, I won the 'Best in Show' Award. My friendship with de Kooning continued until his death." § "My great good fortune and a major part of my artistic development was not only being de Kooning's assistant, but also being part of the Tenth Street Cooperative Gallery Movement. In 1959, I joined the Tenth Street's March Gallery and showed with Mark di Suvero. I continued showing downtown at the Great Jones Gallery, and in 1961, I had my first one-person show at the Gallery Mayer, an uptown gallery that represented artists including John Graham and Man Ray." [Penelope Karageorge]
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
F.P. Student Award Show 1952 The Providence Journal, RI
REYNOLDS, NANCY Pembroke Record 1955 Pembroke College, Providence, RI
J.S. Listing 1959 Art News
A.S. Listing 1959 Art News
SARRINEN, ALICE B. Critic 1959 The New York Times Magazine, NY
ASHTON, DORE Critic 1959 Arts & Architecture
KIPLINGER, SUZANNE Critic 1959 The Village Voice, NY
CATALOGUE Art U.S.A. 1959 Colliseum
ASHTON, DORE Tenth Street Stroll 1959 The New York Times, NY
WALLACE, DEAN Critic 1960 San Francisco Chronicle, CA
G.D. Listing 1960 Art News
FRANKENSTEIN, ALFRED New York's Tenth Street Painters 1960 San Francisco Chronicle, CA
CATALOGUE Art 333 1960
DE KOONING, ELAINE Catalogue 1961 Joachim Gallery, Chicago, IL
HART, HOWARD Catalogue 1962 Louis Alexander Gallery
LIPSON, KARIN Hamptons In Hempstead 1966 Newsday
KRAMER, HILTON The Group 1971 The New York Times, NY
SHIREY, DAVID Westbeth Birthday 1972 The New York Times, NY
CLARK, BOB The Group 1972 Albright College, Reading, PA
BROWN, GORDON Critic 1971, 1973 Arts Magazine
ALLOWAY, LAWRENCE Tenth Street Days 1977 New York, NY
LUBELL, ELLEN Critic 1978 The SoHo Weekly, NY
HARRISON, HELEN A. Critic 1980, 1986, 1994 The New York Times Long Island Weekly, NY
PELLICONE, WILLIAM Critic 1980 Artspeak
DE KOONING, ELAINE Zacharias: Abstract Illusionism 1980 Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, NY
PRESTON, MALCOLM Critic 1981 The Arts
PERONA, PALMA Artspeak: From Abstraction To Representation 1981
PROHASKA, ELENA Art World 1981 Elena Prohaska Gallery, New York, NY
BRAFF, PHYLLIS Critic 1980, 1983 The East Hampton Star, NY
MINSKY, RICHARD Zacharias: The Evolution of an Abstract Imaging System 1983 Adagio Gallery, Bridgehampton, NY
ROWE, NOWE Anniversary Portfolio 1985 The East Hampton Star, NY
WALLACH, AMEI Ordinary and Extraordinary Uses 1986 Newsday
FRESSOLA, MICHAEL J. Critic 1986 Staten Island Advance, NY
CUNNINGHAM, PETER Critic 1986 Southampton Press, NY
LONG, ROBERT Critic 1987, 1988, 1994, 1997 Southampton Press, NY
SLIVKA, ROSE C. Critic 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1998, 1999 The East Hampton Star, NY
KEENE, ROBERT Observations 1989 Southampton Press, NY
LYONS, CHRISTINE Critic 1990 Dan's Papers
MAGIET, JOAN Spotlight 1990 Hampton Highlights, NY
KENNEDY, DONALD Critic 1993 The Independent
BRAFF, PHYLLIS Critic 1994 The New York Times Long Island Weekly, NY
NICHOLAS, FOTINE Z. Critic 1994 The Greek American
WOLLBERG WEISS, MARION Critic 1998, 2006 Dan's Papers
