Harry Holtzman

Harry Holtzman (June 8, 1912 – September 25, 1987) was an American artist and founding member of the American Abstract Artists group.

At the age of fourteen, Holtzman visited the Société Anonyme’s 1926 “International Exhibition of Modern Art” at the Brooklyn Museum and developed an early interest in advanced art with the guidance and encouragement of a high school teacher.

At sixteen, in 1928, he began attending the Art Students League of New York and became an active participant in League activities, serving as a monitor and contributing to the quarterly magazine. At a membership meeting in early 1932, Holtzman’s remarks against the xenophobia of the League’s director were instrumental in carrying a membership vote that brought George Grosz and Hans Hofmann to teach at the League. At the close of this meeting, Burgoyne Diller, a Hofmann protege, taken by Holtzman’s independence of mind, introduced himself, beginning an important lasting relationship. (1)(5)(8)(9)

In this period and working directly from the nude Harry Holtzman produced a wide corpus of drawings that reveals a progressive evolution towards abstraction, expressing his clearly understanding of the Cézanne's lesson.(1)(3)

Step by step his work, using his own words, become " absolutely pure, very much in a kind of expressionist so called abstract expressionism vene" (3) Harry Holtzman was part of the first exhibition of abstract art organized at the Art Student League, with B.Diller, Albert Swinden, Albert Wilkenson. (1)

From 1933 the Abstract research of the artist evolves then into a series of rectilinear works, basically an independent abstraction from external objects, an important work of this period is 'Dynamic Equilibrium of Movement and Contromovement'(#661 Estate of Harry Holtzman).

An untitles gouache painting of the same year (# 606 Estate of Harry Holtzman) shows the carried on argument with Diller over whether circular forms could be integrated into a grid arrangement without seeming to be indiscreet and arbitrary, from this discussion Harry Holtzman decided they could not. (9)(11)

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