Quick Facts
Biography
April Gornik (born 1953, Cleveland, Ohio) is an American artist who paints American landscapes. Her realist yet dreamlike paintings and drawings embody oppositions and speak to America's historically conflicted relationship with nature. While she doesn't categorize herself as an environmental artist, she is a passionate supporter of environmental causes and has said, "I have no problem with people reading an ecological message into my work."Her husband is painter Eric Fischl. Art dealer Ed Thorp hosted her first solo exhibition in 1981, after having caught sight of her paintings while viewing Fischl's work. She is influenced by the feminist consciousness-raising of the late 20th century and, in speaking about female artists who have worked in the shadows of better known male artists, including Elaine de Kooning and Lee Krasner, she has said, "It's a problem. Women artists still receive lower prices for their art and remain less shown than their male counterparts."
Among the public collections in America and Canada that include Gornik's paintings, her Virga (1992) and Storm and Fires (1990) are held in the Smithsonian American Art Museum collection.
Gornik has received several awards: the Neuberger Museum of Art Annual Honoree (2004), the Lifetime Achievement in the Arts Honoree by the Guild Hall Academy of the Arts (2003), and the Award of Excellence for Artistic Contributions to the Fight Against AIDS from the American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR).
In 2007, the Smithsonian Art Collectors Program commissioned Gornik to produce a print to benefit the educational and cultural programs of the Smithsonian Associates in 2007. The lithograph, entitled Blue Moonlight hangs in the ongoing exhibition Graphic Eloquence in the S. Dillon Ripley Center in the National Mall, Washington, D.C.
One person exhibitions
Gornik's work has been showcased in numerous one person exhibitions in galleries and museums throughout the world.
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Selected group exhibitions
Gornik's work has been included in numerous group exhibitions in galleries and museums throughout the world.
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2013
NY.
2012
Jewish Museum, San Francisco, CA
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NY
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A Tribute to James and Mari Michener, Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas
Public collections
Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax, Canada Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada Collection of ART in Embassies, US Chancery in Beijing, China Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX Boise Art Museum, Boise, ID Brooklyn Museum of Art, NY Castellani Museum of Art, Niagara, NY Cincinnati Museum, Cincinnati, OH City College of New York, New York, NY Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, ME Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX Dayton Art Institute, Dayton, OH Douglas S. Cramer Foundation, Los Angeles, CA Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, CA Fisher Landau Center, Long Island City, NY Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, NY Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, WA Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA Huntington Museum of Art, Huntington, WV Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Museum, New Brunswick, NJ The Jewish Museum, New York, NY Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Fort Worth, TX Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, NJ Neuberger Museum, Purchase, NY Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, FL Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, NY Snite Museum, Notre Dame, IN Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, MA United States Embassy, Moscow, Russia University Art Museum, C.S.U., Long Beach, CA University Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY William & Florence Schmidt Art Center, Belleville, IL