Manuel Neri: The Human Figure in Plaster and on Paper explores the artist’s tireless fascination with the human form, drawing from a recent gift to the Gallery of more than 150 sculptures and works on paper from The Manuel Neri Trust. A contemporary of other notable California-based artists such as Elmer Bischoff, Joan Brown, Richard Diebenkorn, David Park, and Wayne Thiebaud, Manuel Neri (b. 1930) is best known for his life-sized plaster, bronze, and marble sculptures that combine classical figuration with the dynamic mark making of Abstract Expressionism. Gallery director Jock Reynolds, who studied under Neri and served as his teaching assistant at the University of California, Davis, curates the exhibition, paying homage to his former teacher and mentor. The selected works celebrate Neri’s studio process, which Reynolds observed firsthand, and illustrate the artist’s tendency to work and rework his sculptures in visceral explorations of form and color.
Past exhibition
Exhibition: Manuel Neri: The Human Figure in Plaster and on Paper
Manuel Neri, Re-making of Mary Julia No. 6, 1976. Plaster, steel, Styrofoam, and burlap. Yale University Art Gallery, Gift of The Manuel Neri Trust. © The Manuel Neri Trust
Views of the Exhibition
Exhibition made possible by the Joann and Gifford Phillips, Class of 1942, Fund; the Raymond and Helen Runnells DuBois Publication Fund; the Rosalee and David McCullough Family Fund; the Stephen S. Lash Fund; and the Wolfe Family Exhibition and Publication Fund. Organized by Jock Reynolds, the Henry J. Heinz II Director.
