About
Photo by Brooks Anderson
Brooks Anderson’s eloquent oil on canvas and panel landscapes are an exploration into the power of Contemporary Landscape painting. Known for his gifted handling of composition, detail, and clarity of light, he evokes in paint the experience of atmosphere and natural phenomena. In 1982, he graduated California State University, Northridge, with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. Then in 1984, the renowned New York art critic Theodore F. Wolff discovered his work, and suggested that David Findlay, Jr., Fine Art should represent him. For the next decade he was represented there, as well as the Schmidt-Bingham and Sherry French Galleries in New York City. Olga Dollar and William Sawyer Galleries in San Francisco represented his work on the West Coast.
His paintings are now found in numerous collections, including the Philbrook Museum in Tulsa, and are featured in the seminal book, Spirit of Place: Contemporary American Realism in the Landscape Tradition, by John Arthur. His work was purchased by this museum, and was included in the museum’s multi-city exhibition, entitled “Green Woods and Crystal Waters: The American Landscape Tradition.” Anderson is currently being represented by the Addington Gallery in Chicago, and Cooper and Smith in Essex, Connecticut. This year the Art Museum of Sonoma County is exhibiting his work in a comprehensive retrospective: “LANDSCAPE: Awe to Activism.”
It is in his new series of large-scale, spiritually-evocative paintings that his vision opens up and aspires to majesty. Here he portrays the landscape in a contemporary context—pristine, modern meditations on land, sea, and sky, as if there is a divine structure beneath the surface. There is a riveting, imminent, and haunting quality to these numinous paintings of the natural world. Brooks Anderson, who lives in northern California, takes relish in the act of painting, responding to what is happening on the surface of the work. He builds up layers of vibrant, transparent color, while simultaneously harnessing an energy in the composition. Anderson dives beneath the surface appearance of his subject matter to discover something irresistibly profound.
CURRENT REPRESENTATION
Brooks Anderson's work is currently on view:
Addington Gallery Chicago, IL 312.664.3406 www.addingtongallery.com
Andra Norris Gallery Burlingame, CA 650-235-9775 www.andranorrisgallery.com
Lia Skidmore Contemporary Art Palm Desert, CA 310-922-5070 skidmorecontemporaryart.com
Sue Greenwood Fine Art Laguna Beach, CA 949.494.0669 www.suegreenwoodfineart.com
EDNA Contemporary San Luis Obispo 805.459.1711 www.ednacontemporary.com
EDUCATION
Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, California State University, Northridge, 1982
MUSEUM EXHIBITION
2020 The Museum of Sonoma County, Santa Rosa, CA “LANDSCAPE: AWE TO ACTIVISM”
MUSEUM COLLECTION
The Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK
SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS/ACQUISITIONS
American AgCredit Worldwide Headquarters, Santa Rosa, CA
AT&T, NY
Citibank, NY; San Francisco, CA
Deloitte, Haskins, and Sells, New York, NY
E.F. Hutton and Co, Inc, NY
General Electric, New York, NY
Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher, Tokyo, Japan
The Art Collection of Massachusetts Financial Services, Boston, MA
Medtronic Corporation, Northridge, CA
Metropolitan Life Insurance Co, Inc, NY
Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK
Principia College, Elsah, IL
Seavest Collection of Contemporary Realism, NY
Sutter Health, Sutter Pacific Medical Foundation, San Francisco, CA
Sutter Regional Hospital, Santa Rosa, CA
NATIONAL TOUR EXHIBITION
The Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa. OK “Green Woods and Crystal Waters: The American Landscape Tradition,” Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, FL; Davenport Museum of Art, Davenport, IA
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2019 Cooper and Smith, Essex, CT
2018 Addington Gallery, Chicago, IL
2012 Red Door Gallery, Richmond, VA
1988 New York Stock Exchange, NY
1986-1992 Schmidt-Bingham Gallery, NY
1986 David Findlay, Jr. Fine Art, NY
1984 Bolen Gallery, Santa Monica, CA
PUBLICATIONS AND MEDIA
“Daring Methods, Daring Paintings, the Art of Brooks Anderson” American Artist Magazine, Christopher Willard, February 2006
“Green Woods and Crystal Waters — The American Landscape Tradition” John Arthur, Philbrook Museum of Art Publishers
Canyon de Chelly: 100 years of Painting and Photography” Donald Hagerty, Gibbs Smith Publishers, 1996
Arthur, John. “Spirit of Place: Contemporary Landscape Painting and the American Tradition”
“The Oregon Coast — Paintings by Brooks Anderson” Diversion Magazine, Leslie Weeden, August 1989
“Brooks Anderson” ARTS Magazine, Scott Douglas Allen, 1986
“America: New Vistas” ART/World, Richard Hunnewell
"Taking Serenity Seriously — Brooks Anderson” The Christian Science Monitor, Theodore F. Wolff, series on “The Many Masks of Modern Art” April 25, 1985
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2011 Chris Winfield Gallery, Carmel, CA
2008 Sonoma County Museum, Santa Rosa, CA
2007 Arches Gallery, Healdsburg, CA
2007 Wendt Gallery, Laguna, CA “Bay Area Influence"
2005 Seavest Collection of Contemporary Realism, Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase College, NY
2003 Addington Gallery, Chicago, IL
1998 I. Wolk Gallery, Saint Helena, CA
1998, 1984-1986 David Findlay, Jr., Fine Art, New York, NY
1999 Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK “Green Woods and Crystal Waters”
1996 Alice Bingham Gallery, Memphis, TN
1995 Mulligan-Shanoski Gallery, San Francisco, CA
1994 Eideljorg Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN “New Art of the West 4"
1994 Susan Broden Gallery, Madison, WI
1994 Gilcrease Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK “American Art in Miniature”
1993 Sherry French Gallery, New York, NY
1993 Frick Gallery, Belfast, ME
1986-1992 Schmidt-Bingham Gallery, NY
1993 Gloria Runnings Gallery, Seattle, WA
1993 Olga Dollar Gallery, San Francisco, CA
1991 Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Winston-Salem, NC
1988 Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art, Loretto, PA
1988 Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson, MI
1986 Orlando Museum of Art, Lock Haven, FL “Contemporary Romantic Landscape Painting”
1986 Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA
1986 New York Academy of Art, New York, NY
1986 William Sawyer Gallery, San Francisco, CA
1986 William Sawyer Gallery, San Francisco, CA
1984 Bolen Gallery, Los Angeles, CA