Provenance

Robert Rogers, Halifax

Born in Frankfort, Indiana in 1941, Art Green studied painting at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and rose to prominence in 1966 as a founding member of the Hairy Who, alongside fellow SAIC graduates Jim Falconer, Gladys Nilsson, Jim Nutt, Suellen Rocca, and Karl Wirsum. In 1969 Green joined the faculty at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, married Natalie Novotny—whose background in pattern and textile design strongly influenced his work—and later settled in Stratford, Ontario. Green taught at the University of Waterloo from 1977 to 2006.

Over more than three decades, Green developed a highly personal iconography of idealized, recurring motifs—ice cream cones, wood grain, candles, moonlit landscapes, polished fingernails—arranged in eccentric, often puzzling juxtapositions that invite close viewing and interpretation.

Since 1968, Green has held more than 25 solo exhibitions and participated in over 120 group shows internationally, including presentations at the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and the Art Institute of Chicago. His first career retrospective, Heavy Weather, was organized by the Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery in 2005. His work is held in major museum collections worldwide, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the National Gallery of Canada, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and the Yale University Art Gallery.