Cattails and Skipper Moth, 2005
ink and Japanese watercolor
14 x 11 inches
Louis Stern Fine Arts is pleased to present Henry T. Hopkins: Sixteen Drawings.The exhibition runs from December 14 through December 23 with a private reception for the artist from 6 – 9PM on Wednesday December 13.
In the beginning, in the early fifties at Chicago’s Art Institute, Henry Hopkins’ studied to be a practicing artist. Then Los Angeles intervened in the form of an Art History graduate studies program at UCLA. Once in the midst of the blossoming Los Angeles art scene, Hopkins traded in his notions of making art and simply began to make art history.
Throughout his entirely remarkable career in the arts, Hopkins has used all his professional incarnations (museum director, gallery director, curator, educator, consultant and even commissioner) to champion fresh eyes, create context and ascribe meaning to contemporary art. Artists the likes of Ed Ruscha, Larry Bell, Joe Goode, Robert Rauschenberg, Lorser Feitelson, Jasper Johns, Helen Lundeberg, Philip Guston, William Wiley and a number of German Expressionists have all benefited from Hopkins’ meticulous, informed and generous curatorial convictions. By virtue of his tireless endeavors, Hopkins has encouraged generations of potential artists, collectors and arts institutions to reclassify this field as not merely a personal passion but a cultural necessity. For Hopkins, art has been the eternal requirement, as essential for meaningful life as life itself.
Now, officially retired though ever in demand, Hopkins has turned an eye back toward his initial studies. In this series of drawings, single blossoms, each executed in delicate touches of Japanese watercolor and ink, fill the meticulously described frame. Each flower seems to greet us as a harbinger of spring and also as a proud reminder of the unadulterated pleasures of drawing. As usual with anything to which Mr. Hopkins applies his considerable talent, the entire project is a complete class act.
This exhibition marks Mr. Hopkins initial showing with Louis Stern Fine Arts.