Hans Hofmann (1880–1966) was one of the most progressive and influential art teachers in America in the 20th century, an achievement that has often overshadowed his artistic accomplishments. The focused exhibition Hans Hofmann presents a small but revealing selection of paintings and works on paper from the collection of the Yale University Art Gallery that engage with Hofmann’s dual legacy as an artist-teacher and illustrate how teaching informed his own prolific output. From 1934 to 1935, when Hofmann founded his eponymous schools in New York City and Provincetown, Massachusetts, to 1957, when he closed both to devote himself to painting, he brought a dynamic approach to instruction in the formal principles of color, form, and space. In this Gallery Talk, Michèle Wije, Curatorial Project Manager and the exhibition’s organizer, highlights how Hofmann’s artistic practice is indebted to the traditions of European Modernism but also marked by radical innovation and contradictory extremes. Offered in conjunction with the exhibition Hans Hofmann. 

Meet by the central column in the Gallery lobby. Space is limited.