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​ARTIST BIOGRAPHY

Paul Horiuchi

Paul Horiuchi was born in Japan in 1906 and immigrated to the US as a teenager. Upon landing in the states, Horiuchi was employed as a railroad worker in the West, before settling in Seattle in 1946. Through his close friend, Mark Tobey (1890 - 1976) Horiuchi became involved in the Northwest School, which shared the artist's interest in Eastern design and philosophy. While originally an oil painter, Horiuchi eventually shifted to the medium of collage, for which he is most well-known today.

Employing patches of torn, hand-made and dyed paper, the artist's oeuvre is characterized by abstract compositions which favor large blocks of color over concrete symbolism. Although produced contemporaneously, his work is regarded as separate from the Color Field artists of the 1950s and 60s. Horiuchi described his collages as "attempts to produce areas of peace and serenity with which to balance the sensationalism [...] of our time." Horiuchi's work can be seen around the world, including at the SF MOMA, the Seattle Art Museum, the Smithsonian Museum, the Cambridge Art Museum, and the Tokyo Museum of Modern Art. His most well known public piece, a 17 x 60 foot collage mural, can be seen at the Seattle Center amphitheater, in Seattle, WA.surrealist and mystic by nature, Morris Graves is perhaps the most enigmatic of the Northwest School’s “big four.” Graves is known for his incorporation of Eastern spirituality and symbolism into his artwork, often using the images of the bird or “inner eye” to communicate his own form of transcendental philosophy. Though he exhibited widely during his time, the artist was somewhat of a recluse, preferring the solitude of his island home (which he nicknamed, “the Rock”) to the hustle and bustle of urban Seattle.

Graves rose to prominence in 1942, when Dorothy C. Miller, curator for New York’s MoCA, included the artist in a show at the museum, entitled “Americans 1942: 18 Artists from 9 States.” Over the ensuing years of his career, Graves exhibited at prestigious museums throughout the United States, including the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, and the Phillips Collection in Washington. Prior to his death, the artist created the Morris Graves Foundation, which turned his idyllic home into an artist’s retreat. The Morris Graves Museum of Art in Eureka, California bears his name, and holds his work in its permanent collection.

For additional information about this artist, visit William A. Karges Fine Art