Sherman Drexler

Sherman Drexler (January 3, 1925 – July 19, 2014) was an American figurative expressionist painter best known for his paintings of female nudes. He later taught at several institutions, including Cooper Union School of Art (1974) and the University of Pennsylvania (1980). His career spanned more than 50 years. He was married to Pop artist and playwright Rosalyn Drexler.

Sherman Drexler was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1925. He spent his infancy in Seagate, Coney Island but he grew up mainly in the Bronx. Drexler began painting at an early age; he took up and painting in earnest when he was 17 years old, modelling his work after Henri Matisse and Amadeo Modigliani. He was admitted to University of California, Berkeley as an English major, but began studying the works of Old Masters, Da Vinci in particular, and left Berkeley without completing his studies there. He earned his degree a decade later when he returned to receive a B.F.A.

Drexler's first exhibition, in 1956, was in Berkeley, California at the Courtyard Gallery. Drexler returned to New York in the same year and began teaching at a local junior high school. In 1958, Drexler made his New York premier with an exhibition at the Seven Arts Gallery. He also enrolled at Hunter College where he studied under prominent artists including Robert Motherwell.

Although Drexler was a figurative painter at a time when abstract expressionism enjoyed great popularity, he soon became a part of the New York School of the late 1950s and 1960s. He met and befriended Franz Kline, Andy Warhol and Alex Katz. In the early 1960s Drexler was featured in many solo exhibitions including shows at New York City galleries including the Rice and Tibor De Nagy Galleries. Many of Drexler's works in this period took female nudes as subjects, setting them against monochromatic backgrounds. Drexler's works often made reference to contemporary events, including Pete Rose's defeat by Joe DiMaggio, or mythical/biblical narratives, such as Leda and the Swan or Adam and Eve's expulsion from Eden. Drexler's works often portrayed the human body in motion.

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