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Prentiss Taylor (1907-1991)

ARTIST BIO

Prentiss Taylor, a distinguished American artist with national and international renown, has left a legacy of 142 lithographs done in 1931-1983. These are documented in the Catalogue Raisonne by Ingrid Rose and Roderick Quiroz, published by Hofstra University in 1996. Nearly all of his prints and many of his oils and other works are represented in the permanent collections of numerous museums and major libraries. An Academician of the National Academy of Design, he studied with Charles Hawthorne and at the Arts Students League. His work has been exhibited nationally and abroad. During the 20th Century, Taylor was "quietly building a career of very great integrity over five decades" (Joann Lewis, Wash. Post, 1981). He served as president of the Society of Washington Printmakers for 34 years and did pioneering work in art theorapy with mental patients at Washington hospitals. Notable also are his early artistic collaboration and friendship with poet-novelist Langston Hughes. In the Washington, DC area, major one-man shows include those at the Smithsonian Institution, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, and the Baltimore Museum of Art. Major late exhibits include a print retrospective at Georgetown University (1990) and, after his death, a show of oils, watercolors, and selected prints at the Mickelson Gallery.

Among his most reproduced prints are "The Bridge Sunday", "Christ in Alabama", and "Scottsboro Limited". His wide thematic range includes diverse regional evocations (New England, the South and Southwest, Mexico, Spain, etc.), as well as music and architecture. Taylor's prints are marked by a highly personal yet transcendental style, with realism often enhanced by surreal elements. Technically, his lithographs "are of beautiful texture, much more subtle in use of light and shade than most prints in this medium" (H. Buchalter), very sensitive, with delicacy and unusal felling for design" (Lynd Ward), and "civilized and delightful-always saturated with a personal style" (Carl Zigrosser).

[bio provided by Roderick Quiroz]