Alice Baber

Alice Baber was an American abstract expressionist painter who worked in oil and watercolor. She was educated in the United States and in the 1950s and 1960s she studied and lived in Paris. She also traveled around the world. Baber, a feminist, organized exhibits of women artists' work.

Baber began her career working primarily in oils, but began experimenting with watercolor paints in the 1950s. Her experimentation with watercolor initiated a shift in style for Baber as she went from painting still lifes to creating more abstracted works. Her abstract works focus on color and form with shapes such as the circle being a common motif. Baber was well known for her use of light and color holding several exhibitions devoted to these themes.

In 1958, Baber had her first solo show in New York at March Gallery where she was a member. In that same year, she was also granted a studio residency at the Yaddo Art Colony. During this time, she began to develop her unique explorations of color that derive from the "infinite range of possibilities" for exploring color and light within the form of the circle. She told Brian Jones that she was looking for a "way to get the light moving across the whole thing" in Battle of the Oranges. This creative inspiration became fundamental to her artistic approach.

In 1959, she showed paintings throughout Europe, including the first "Jeune Biennale" of the American Cultural Center in Paris, France. Her early life as a "nomad" may have influenced her somewhat: she began to divide her years by living in France for six months every year for a period of time.

In 1975, Baber curated the exhibition "Color, Light and Image". An international exhibition of 125 women artists in celebration of the United Nations' International Women's Year. The show was held at the Women's Interart Center in New York City.

From 1976 to 1978, Baber traveled to 13 Latin American countries with the U.S. State Department, exhibiting her work and lecturing on art. In 1979, Baber was an artist-in-residence at the Tamarind Institute print workshop.

The Alice Baber Memorial Art Library in East Hampton, New York and the Baber Midwest Modern Art Collection of the Greater Lafayette Museum of Art in Indiana are both named in her honor. Numerous museums around the world and major galleries in the United States own her works, including the Guggenheim, Whitney, Metropolitan, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Georgia Museum of Art. She is also widely collected by private, corporate and university collections. Her art reflects, but defies "various stylistic trends" and is "imbued with undulating, sensuous movement, and...pure, translucent colors."

Text courtesy of Wikipedia, 2023