Ken Rush balances his time between Brooklyn and Vermont. He has had numerous solo exhibitions since 1985, and Ken’s paintings have been reviewed in ArtnewsArtnews, Vermont Life magazine, as well as many regional publications. His work is in the permanent public collections of the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, the Brooklyn Historical Society, The New York State Museum (Albany), The Bennington Museum, the The SUArt (Syracuse University) Galleries, Hudson County Community College, Bergen Community College, and the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation. His 1990s children’s books (The Seltzer Man, Friday’s Journey, and What About Emma?) were reviewed in The New York Times Book Review, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, Smithsonian Magazine, and School Library Journal. Ken lives in Brooklyn (since 1971), and was the upper school visual arts and art history teacher at Packer Collegiate Institute in Brooklyn Heights from 1978 to 2015. Since leaving teaching he has maintained as full time studio practice.
Ken is represented by the 3 Pears Gallery in Dorset, Vermont and The Court Tree Collective in Brooklyn, New York.
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Statement
New York City and New England have been important inspirations for my work since 1971. I have worked both from life and from imagination, often returning to the same type of subject again and again. The Gowanus Canal, for example, has been one of the constants in my work. For an artist who grew up in the well-manicured suburbs of Rye, New York, the Canal provides a compelling contrast, not only as subject matter, but also in the actual experience of setting my canvas on a Brooklyn street and working “plein air.”
“Like the canyons of the city, [the Vermont landscape] has provided me with an artistic rubric, one where I am able to explore and look for different outcomes.”
My lifelong attachment to the Vermont landscape is the other constant in my work. The New England gabled house is a place and a form that has special meaning. It is a shape that is both realistic and abstract, and a locale that is mysterious yet familiar. Like the canyons of the city, it has provided me with an artistic rubric, one where I am able to explore and look for different outcomes. The shape of the house, its angled roof and shadowed side, have become an embedded gesture in the physical creation of my work as well as the psychological icon which propels it.
Creating imaginary studio landscapes provides a counterpoint to the specificity of my plein air work. Studio paintings offer a particular freedom and force me to consider surprising outcomes. When I paint a studio landscape, I feel that the work is in essence painting itself.
Resume
EDUCATION
Syracuse University School of Fine Arts, BFA Cum Laude, Syracuse, NY, 1971
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Skowhegan, ME, 1968
Sir John Cass College of Art, London, England, 1969-70
The Taft School, Watertown, CT, 1963-67
AWARDS & GRANTS
Artist Keyholder Program, Lower Eastside Printshop, NY 1988
Sabbatical Leave Grant, Packer Collegiate Institute, Brooklyn, NY, 1988
Best in Show Jury Award, Annual Drawing Exhibition, The Rotunda Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 1987
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC) Grant, for a site specific installation, 1985
Artist Material Grant, The Polaroid Corporation, Cambridge, MA, 1984
Sponsored Exhibition Grant, New York State Council on the Arts, 1983
Babbott Chair Holder, Packer Collegiate Institute, Brooklyn, NY, 1982-4
Outstanding Senior in Painting, Hazard-Hiram Gee Fellowship for Travel, Syracuse, NY
University School of Art, Syracuse, NY, 1971
First Place Award Painting, New England Boarding School Competition, 1967
Visual Arts Prize, The Taft School, Watertown, CT, 1967
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2023
The Dorset Quarry: Paintings and Prints by Ken Rush The 3 Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT, July - August
2021
Summer Memories, The 3 Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT, July - August
Poolside, Court Tree Collective Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, Artsy Virtual exhibit, January - March
2019
Recent Landscapes, The 3 Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT, July - August
Recent Subway Paintings, wall installation of small paintings, George Billis Gallery, Chelsea, NYC, July 2019
2018
Noon at Coney Island, installation of a 1987 painting, The Brooklyn Historical Society, Brooklyn, NY, October - March
2017
Summer Memories, The 3 Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT, August - September
2015
Ken Rush Paintings, The 3 Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT, August - September
Nocturnes, Galerie Provenance, Middlebury, VT, May - June
2011
Places: Ken Rush, Opalia, Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY, May 2011
2000-2008
Venice Paintings, The Southern Vermont Arts Center, Manchester, VT, August 2008
The Mark W. Potter Gallery, The Taft School, Watertown, CT, May 2007
Canyons, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY, September, 2006
The Southern Vermont Arts Center, Manchester, VT, February 2005
The Southern Vermont Arts Center, Manchester, VT, August 2001
1980s
Recent Painting, The Palm Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 1985
Painted Polaroids, The Palm Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 1984
Polaroid Paintings, The Rome Art Center, Rome, NY, 1983
PUBLIC COMMISSIONS
2022, POOLEVATOR
A site-specific painted installation of a freight elevator in Industry City, Brooklyn. Commissioned by The Collision Project, IC.
1985, The Vendors
A site-specific Polaroid installation in the lobby of 140 Broadway. Funded by The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. 1985.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023
Towers Rising: 911 Memorial and Museum, May 2023-June 2024, Special exhibition gallery.
2022
FAMILIAL, Court Tree Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Parks and Recreation, The Bennington Museum and the Bryan Memorial Gallery, Bennington & Jeffersonville, VT
2021
Invitational, George Billis Gallery, Westport, CT
2018
Summer Invitational, George Billis Gallery, NY, NY
2017
Summer Invitational, George Billis Gallery, NY, NY
2016
Summer Invitational, George Billis Gallery, NY, NY
Summer Work, The Three Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT
2015
Summer Exhibit, Furchgott and Sourdiffe Gallery, Shelburn, VT, July - August
Continual Showing, The 3 Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT
2010
A Sense of Place, Two person exhibition. August 2010, Southern Vermont Arts Center, Manchester, Vermont
2000-2009
Realism and Almost Realism: Summer exhibition, 2009, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY
Champlain’s Lake Rediscovered: Vermont Artists Celebrate the Lake, A travelling exhibition featuring the work of 38 artists to commemorate the Quadricentenial of Champlain’s arrival at Lake Champlain. Exhibit venues: Vermont, Boston, and NYC. June - September 2009
Four Landscape Artists: March Avery, Steven Bigler, Michele Harvey, Ken Rush, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY, 2009
Loose Borders: Painting mediating Abstraction and Representation, February 2006, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY
20 Years: Anniversary Exhibition, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY
Landscape 2005: Three Visions, Three person exhibition, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY, January - February 2005, Reviewed: April 2005 Artnews magazine)
Group show of gallery artists, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY, December 2003
Alternate Visions: Contemporary Landscape, Six artists, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY Summer 2003
Holiday Group Show, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY, December 2002
20/20 Group Exhibition, The Rotunda Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, November 2002
Holiday Realities, Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY December 2001
Bridges of Brooklyn, Brooklyn College Gallery, Brooklyn, NY Curated by Maria Rand, 2001
1970-1999
New York City in Children’s Books: Yesterday and Today, New York Public Library, Donnell Library Center, NY, NY, 1995 (Reviewed in The New York Times)
A Painters’ Brooklyn, Pratt Institute and Pratt Manhattan Center, 1988
Drawing Annual, The Rotunda Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 1987
The Brooklvn Landscape, Curated by Jackie Battenfield, The Rotunda Gallery, Brooklvn, NY, 1985
Art & Ego, 419 Lafayette Street Gallery, NY, NY 1984
Art on the Pier, Chicago, IL, 1984
Fragments, The Brooklyn Downtown Cultural Center, Brooklyn, NY, 1983
Karnival, Kamikaze Club, NY, NY, 1984
Terminal, NY, The Brooklyn Army Terminal, Brooklyn, NY, 1983
Alumni Artists Exhibition, 1979, 17 Artists selected from the alumni of Syracuse University, Lubin House Gallery, NY, NY, 1979
Boerum Hill Artists, Community Gallery, The Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY, 1978
The Brooklyn Museum Art School Faculty Exhibitions, Brooklyn, NY, 1975-79
Art in Embassy Program, United States State Department, 1970-79
A Sense of Place: the Artist and the American Land, National traveling exhibition curator Alan Gussow, 1974-5
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
SUArt Galleries, Syracuse University Art Museum and collection
The Brooklyn Historical Society, Brooklyn, NY
The Bennington Museum, Bennington, VT
The National 9/11 Memorial and Museum, NY, NY
Percent for Art - Public art fund purchase, City of New York, 1993
The New York State Museum, Albany, NY
Hudson County Community College Collection, Jersey City, NJ
The Packer Collegiate Institute Collection, Brooklyn, NY
NUMEROUS PRIVATE COLLECTIONS
The Rod and Alice Moorhead Collection Robert Storr
Carla Shen Collection
Ben Shahn (Deceased)
William Edward O’Reily
The Polaroid Corporation International Collection
AUCTION RECORD
Two small oil paintings from 1972 sold at Christie’s Rockefeller Center for their high estimate in a 2011 sale.
GALLERY REPRESENTATION
2020 - Present: Court Tree Collective Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
2014 - Present: The Three Pears Gallery, Dorset, VT
2015 - 2018: Michael Findlay Gallery, Middlebury, VT
2012 - 2014: Hudson and Light Gallery, Hudson, NY
2001 - 2009: Katharina Rich Perlow Gallery, NY, NY
1997 - 1999: Furchgott and Sourdiffe Gallery, Shelburne, VT
1987 - 1992: Capricorn Gallery, Bethesda, MD
1984 - 1987: The Palm Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
1982 - 1984: Dobrick Gallery, Chicago, IL
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The Woven Tale Press, Summer issue, 2019, Feature review of Ken Rush, 3 Pears Gallery.
The Brooklyn Eagle, profile of artist, 2019
Aishti Magazine, 44 (from Beirut), October/November 2009 issue
A House Abstracted: FromBrooklyn the American Artist reinvents Traditional Landscapes, Nicole Anderson
Champlain’s Lake Rediscovered: Vermont Artists Celebrate the Lake, 2009 exhibition catalogue
Vermont Life Magazine, Summer 2009, One of four artists featured in an article “Open to Interpretation” about the “Champlain’s Lake Rediscovered Exhibition’
Domino Magazine, June/July 2008, Painting featured in photo spread of Stephen Elrod’s “Buttoned-up Beach House” article.
Landscape 2005: Three Visions, Reviewed April 2005 Artnews magazine
Aperture (#103), Summer 1986, Back cover spread
Alumni Artists, Syracuse University Press, 1979
A Sense of Place: The Artist and the American Land, Volume II, 1974
Art in Embassies Program: Residence of the United States Ambassador, Paris, France, 1976
CHILDREN’S AUTHOR AND ILLUSTRATOR W0RK
Brickyard Summer by Paul B. Janeczko, Illustrated by Ken Rush, Orchard Books, 1989, Selected: American Library Association: “Best books for the Learning Impaired,” 1989
Some Things Never Change by Kurt Aldag, Illustrated by Ken Rush, Macmillan, 1992, Reviewed: Booklist; School Library Journal; Publisher’s Weekly; Brooklyn Heights Press; Smithsonian Magazine
The Seltzer Man by Ken Rush, Author and illustrator, 1993, Macmillan, Reviewed: Publisher’s Weekly, Booklist, School Library Journal, New York Daily News, New York Newsday, Smithsonian Magazine
Friday’s Journey by Ken Rush, author and Illustrator, Orchard Books, 1994, Reviewed: School Library Journal; Booklist; Horn Book Reviews (Selected as a starred review); The New York Times Book Review. Selected as a Bank Street “Best Books for Children - 1994”. Anthologized “Books about New York,” 2002
What About Emma by Ken Rush, author and ilustrator, Orchard Books, 1996. Reviewed: School Library Journal; Booklist, New Advocate, The Rutland Herald
TEACHING
The Hope Program, Brooklyn, NY, Volunteer Art Teacher to Adults in a Job Readiness Program, 2017-19
Packer Collegiate Institute, Brooklyn, NY (Full-time), High School Visual Arts and Art History Teacher, 1978-2015 Brooklyn Museum Art School, Brooklyn, NY, Painting Instructor Adult Classes, 1975-79
The Taft School, Watertown, CT, Visiting Artist, 1976-78 .
Rye Country Day School, Rye, NY, 1972-75