Forrest Bess (American, 1911 - 1977)

Forrest Bess

American | 1911 - 1977

Forrest Bess was an American Postwar & Contemporary painter who was born in 1911. Numerous key galleries and museums such as Marlborough, New York have featured Forrest Bess's work in the past.Forrest Bess's work has been offered at auction multiple times, with realized prices ranging from 150 USD to 112,900 USD, depending on the size and medium of the artwork. Since 1999 the record price for this artist at auction is 112,900 USD for Untitled No. 6, sold at Sotheby's New York in 2011. Forrest Bess has been featured in articles for Two Coats of Paint, Glasstire and ArtDaily. The most recent article is Conduits at Lo Brutto Stahl written for Art Viewer in November 2023. The artist died in 1977.

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At Auction

Recent Auction Results

Untitled (nude woman, man and chair) - Forrest Bess

Untitled (nude woman, man and chair)

By Forrest Bess
Untitled landscape - Forrest Bess

Untitled landscape

By Forrest Bess

Past Exhibitions

First Person

Franklin Parrasch Gallery
Upper East Side | New York | USA
Aug 03,2023 - Aug 31,2023

Schema: World as Diagram

Marlborough, New York
Chelsea | New York | USA
May 11,2023 - Aug 15,2023

2023 Summer Inventory Sale

Foltz Fine Art
Houston | Texas | USA
May 13,2023 - Jun 17,2023

Articles

Conduits at Lo Brutto Stahl

Conduits at Lo Brutto Stahl  

Art Viewer 29/11/2023
The art of the diagram

The art of the diagram  

Two Coats of Paint 06/07/2023
Review: “Nuestra Delta Mágica” in Brownsville and Humberto Jimenez in Matamoros

Coverage

..For Bess, subconscious human experiences manifested themselves in these abstract and highly symbolic images...

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Fridericianum

..While resonant with Modernist abstraction, Bess’s beautiful and mysterious pictures suggest a spirituality akin to indigenous religious icons...

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Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive, University of California, Berkeley

..Beginning in early childhood, Bess experienced intense hallucinations that both frightened and intrigued him; in 1946, he began to incorporate images from these visions into his paintings...

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The Menil Collection

..By meticulously recording and studying the dream symbols captured in his artwork, Bess hoped to uncover their universal meaning...

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The Menil Collection

..Bess drew meaning for these symbols from various disciplines such as medicine, psychology, anthropology, and philosophy, eventually formulating a theory, which he referred to as his “thesis,” that the...

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Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase College

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