Audrey Flack’s Marilyn in Jersey City Exhibit

‘Marilyn: Golden Girl’ (1978)

One of my favourite artists depicting Marilyn, Audrey Flack, features in ‘Our Own Directions: Four Decades of Photo-Realism’, a new exhibition opening on September 18 at Mana Arts Center, Jersey City. Another of Flack’s paintings has graced the cover of Carl Rollyson’s Marilyn Monroe: A Life of the Actress (1986.)

“Author Louis K. Meisel points out that  Audrey Flack was the lone female artist among the original group of Photorealists.  Despite the challenges of forging a career in a male-dominated art world, Flack is the only Photorealist whose work is included in collections of New York’s four major art museums: the Met, the MoMA, the Whitney and the Guggenheim. The Yale-educated artist abandoned her involvement with an elite group of Abstract Expressionists and moved firmly into realism in the ’50s.  Flack began making paintings based on newspaper and magazine stills of political figures and events, including Hitler and Kennedy’s Motorcade.  Her political subjects were followed by film stars such as Marilyn Monroe, and she also made still life paintings of desserts, cosmetics, jewelry and assorted mementos.  Flack is recognized as an important influence on contemporary artists such as Jeff Koons who acknowledges her influence on the ironic kitsch themes in his work.”

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