joseph drapell
About
copyright © Joseph Drapell 2024

Joseph Drapell was born into the German- (and later Soviet-) occupied small town of Humpolec (near Prague) in 1940. His parents brought up their three boys not to believe in the official propaganda of the occupying regimes. Like the Czech novelist Milan Kundera, Drapell felt that life was elsewhere. Drapell escaped his birth country at his first opportunity at the age of twenty-five in order to develop his art in the free West. He landed in Halifax in 1966, grateful to Canada for accepting him. Drapell adopted an island (B-109) in Georgian Bay as his new spiritual home. The island has inspired (directly or indirectly) all his mature artistic developments to date.

Drapell's aim was to contribute to the art of painting, rather than to merely make a living as an artist. Between 1968 and 1970, he studied under various visiting artists and lecturers at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan. This is where he first started to develop his compression technique as a response to the paintings of Morris Louis. He settled in Toronto in 1970. Drapell walked the streets of New York with a roll of large paintings, until he was discovered by the Robert Elkon Gallery on Madison Avenue. After three exhibitions there (and several in Toronto where he was discovered by Jared Sable of the Dunkelman Gallery), Drapell achieved his first artistic breakthrough in 1974 with the Great Spirit Paintings. Joseph divides his time between Toronto and Georgian Bay (Lake Huron).

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS:

Invited to Syracuse University, N.Y., as Visiting Artist in Residence (1973)

Invited by Sir Anthony Caro to Triangle Artists’ Workshop as Guest Artist (1984)

Museum exhibition Ten Years of J.D. traveled to five museums in Canada (1984-85)

Guest Artist at Emma Lake Workshop (1988) and at The Leighton Foundation (1990)

Drapell has exhibited with New New Painters since 1991

Five cover stories: Art International (1978), artmagazine (1980), Artpost (1990), Revue K (1993), Artfocus (1999)

Museum exhibition The Deepest Layers traveled to four museums in Bohemia (1999-2001)

Drapell’s work has been shown in New York since 1971, in Europe since 1980, in Asia since 1995

Video program Quest for New Art: Painter Joseph Drapell first shown in 1996 at Eurofilm Festival, France, and at 15th International Festival, Montevideo, Uruguay in 1997

Drapell and his wife, the poet Anna Maclachlan, founded the first Museum of New New Painting in 1998 devoted to exhibiting advanced art not yet understood by the art scene

Donates works to establish the Joseph Drapell Award at York University, Toronto

Commissioned by The Toronto Mendelssohn Choir to paint on stage during their performance of Bernstein’s Symphony No. 3 (Oct 2002). Works auctioned for educational charity

Drapell publishes the DVD High Stakes: Global Crisis in Art with companion text by critic Walter Klepac (Nov 2006)

Retrospective My Universe, Drapell@70 (in five installments), Museum of New New Painting, Toronto, 2010-2011 (3 catalogs published)

Monograph Joseph Drapell published in four volumes, 960 pages, size 12” x 12” (2015 Museum of New, Toronto)

Book Cosmic Woman in the Star Chamber sixty works reproduced with an introduction by Matthew Kyba, size 12” x 12” (2017 Museum of New, Toronto)

SOLO EXHIBITIONS:

1968  Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax

1971  Robert Elkon Gallery, New York

1971  Dunkelman Gallery, Toronto

1972  Robert Elkon Gallery, New York

1972  Dunkelman Gallery, Toronto

1973  Robert Elkon Gallery, New York

1973  Dunkelman Gallery, Toronto

1974  Jared Sable Gallery, Toronto

1975  Jared Sable Gallery, Toronto

1977  The Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto

1978  O’Reilly Galleries, New York

1979  Gallery One, Toronto

1980  Thomas Segal Gallery, Boston

1980  Meredith Long Contemporary, New York

1981  Martin Gerard Gallery, Edmonton

1982  Gallery One, Toronto

1982  Thomas Segal Gallery, Boston

1982  Meredith Long, Houston

1983  Gallery One, Toronto

1983  Galerie Elca London, Montreal

1984  Robert Kidd gallery Detroit

1984  Gallery One, Toronto

1984  Galerie Elca London, Montreal

1984  Joseph Drapell: Ten Years a survey exhibition with a catalogue traveling to five museums: Art Gallery of Windsor, Kitchener/Waterloo Art Gallery, Confederation Art Centre P.E.I., Norman MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, Art Gallery of Hamilton, Koffler Art Gallery, Toronto (essay by Karen Wilkin)

1985  Gallery One, Toronto

1985  Buschlen/Movatt Associates, Vancouver

1986  J.D. at Exhibition Space at 112 Greene St., New York City (curated and catalog essay by Karen Wilkin)

1987  Mathew Scott Gallery, South Miami

1987  Eva Cohon Gallery, Chicago

1987  Gallery One, Toronto

1988  Shippee Gallery, New York  The Island Paintings (catalog essay by Ken Carpenter)

1988  Gallery One, Toronto

1989  Galerie Elca London, Montreal

1989  Gallery One, Toronto  The Island Paintings

1989  Kathleen Laverty Gallery, Edmonton  Paintings from Emma Lake Artists’ Workshop

1990  Gallery One, Toronto  50th Birthday Exhibition: The Czech Paintings (catalog)

1991  Moore Gallery, Hamilton  Several Directions in the work of Joseph Drapell

1991  Gallery One, Toronto  Small Paintings from Georgian Bay

1991  Kathleen Laverty Gallery, Edmonton

1991  Canadian Art Gallery, Calgary

1991  Gallery Camino Real, Boca Raton  1985-86 Works

1992  Gallery One, Toronto  The Paradise Paintings

1992  Galerie Elca London, Montreal

1993  Gallery One, Toronto  The “Figure” Paintings

1994  Kathleen Laverty Gallery, Edmonton  Personages

1994  Galerie Dambier Masset, Paris  Individuals

1994  Gallery One, Toronto  Archetypal Figures

1996  Moore Gallery, Hamilton  25 Years of Joseph Drapell

1996  Kathleen Laverty Gallery, Edmonton  Composers

1997  Gallery One, Toronto

1998  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  Drapell’s Art, 1970-98

1999  Moore Gallery, Toronto  Joseph Drapell: Paintings and Sculptures

1999  Gallery One, Toronto  Photographs of Joseph Drapell

1999  Oblastni galerie Vysociny, Jihlava, Bohemia  The Deepest Layers works painted in Drapell’s birthplace, (catalog essay by Dagmar Jelinkova)

1999  Moore Gallery, Toronto  Joseph Drapell at 60 (30 year retrospective)

2000  Muzeum Dr. Alese Hrdlicky, Humpolec, Bohemia  The Deepest Layers

2000  Prachenske Museum, Pisek, Bohemia  The Deepest Layers

2001  Galerie moderniho umeni, Roudnice, Bohemia  The Deepest Layers

2001  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  Universal Images

2002  Roy Thomson Symphony Hall, Toronto  Drapell paints on Stage

2002  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  Joseph Drapell Retrospective

2003  Moore Gallery, Toronto  The Celestial Experiences

2005  Moore Gallery, Toronto  35 years of Drapell’s Art

2005  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  “Anti-drapell”

2006  Moore Gallery, Toronto  Terrorism Quartet

2007  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  The Unknown Drapells

2007  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  The Great Spirit, six works from 1974

2007  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  The New New Landscape

2007  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  Digital Colour Engravings

2008  Moore Gallery, Toronto  Duality & Singularity

2008  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  50 Years of Drapell’s Figures

2008  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  The Great Spirit, North

2008  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  The Nude and The Art of Painting

2009  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  The Nude Continued

2010  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  JOSEPH DRAPELL: My Universe @ 70

2010  The Spoke Club, Toronto  Georgian Bay & Joseph Drapell, November – January, 2011

2010  ART11, Montreal  The Art of Joseph Drapell 25 years retrospective, November – April, 2011

2011  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto  The Cosmic Woman: the Enigma of Georgian Bay, April – May, 2011

2012  Lausberg Contemporary, Toronto  Eternal Return

2013  Museum of New, Toronto  The Earth Quartet and the Classic Period of J.D., Inaugural Exhibition at the newly expanded Museum of New, curated by Morgan Copeman

2014  Birth of New Worlds—The Quartet  Museum of New, Toronto

2015  House of Mirrors  Nikola Rukaj Gallery, Toronto

2017  Cosmic Woman  Museum of New, Toronto

2018  Cosmic Woman—Abstraction  Museum of New, Toronto

2018  Toronto Seasons 2003  Museum of New, Toronto

2018  ORIGIN  Museum of New, Toronto

2019  ORIGIN Part Two  Museum of New, Toronto

2019  The Story of Striations  Museum of New, Toronto

2020  Solar Variations  13th Street Gallery, St. Catharines, Ontario CANADA

2022  Joseph Drapell: Re-Inventing Landscape  13th Street Gallery, St. Catharines, Ontario CANADA

2023  Nude Ascending (Re-Inventing Figure)  Museum of New, Toronto

2023  Liberty  Museum of New, Toronto

2024  DRAPELL  John Mann Gallery, St. Catharines, Ontario CANADA

2024  Night on the Sun  James Rottman Fine Art, Toronto

2024  14 Women  Museum of New, Toronto

COLLECTIONS:

The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

National Gallery, Prague

Museum of Modern Art, Foundation Ludwig, Vienna

The Clement Greenberg Collection at Portland Museum of Art, Oregon

Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo

Minneapolis Institute of Art

The Chase Manhattan Bank, New York

La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla California

AT&T, New York

The Francis J. Greenberger Foundation, New York

Hines International Corporation, Boston

21st Century Master Artworks, New York

Imperial Oil Ltd

Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale

Center for the Arts, Vero Beach, Florida

Camino Foundation, Valduz, Lichtenstein

Vaclav Havel, President of Czech Republic, Prague

Collection of Gerald Piltzer, Paris

Gallery Ism, Seoul, South Korea

Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest

Galerie moderniho umeni, Roudnice, Bohemia

Galerie Klatovy Klenova, Bohemia

Prachenske museum, Pisek

Oblastni galerie Vysociny, Jihlava

Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto

Edmonton Art Gallery

Art Gallery of Hamilton

Toronto-Dominion Bank

Memorial University of New Foundland

Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery

Art Gallery of Windsor

Chevron Standard, Calgary

Royal Bank of Canada

Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina

Shell Calgary

Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Fredericton, New Brunswick

Rothmans of Pall Mall, Canada

Westburne International industries, Montreal

Alcan Ltd, Montreal

Teleglobe, Montreal

David Mirvish Collection, Toronto

Cineplex Odeon Corp. Canada

London Reginal Art Gallery

McIntosh Gallery, University of Western Ontario, London

Red Deer College, Alberta

Art Gallery of Greater Victoria

University of Lethbridge Art Gallery, Alberta

Tom Thomson Memorial Gallery, Peterborough

Canada Council, The Art Bank

University Gallery, Carleton University, Ottawa

The British Museum, London (suite of 4 etchings)

GROUP EXHIBITIONS:

1971  Man and His World  Montreal

1973  New Acqusitions  The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

1976  Ontario Now  Art Gallery of Hamilton

1976  Abstractions  21 Olympiad, Montreal travelling to Stratford Ontario and Paris and London

1977  New Abstract Art  Edmonton Art Gallery (catalog)

1979  Color Abstraction  Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, catalog by Kenworth Moffett, (included were Louis, Bush, Frankenthaler, Noland, Olitski, Poons and Drapell)

1980  The New Generation  Andre Emmerich Gallery, New York, touring Paris (The American Center), Berlin (Amerika Haus), and Lisbon (Sociedade Nacional de Belas Artes (curated and essay by Kenworth Moffett)

1981  Viewpoint-29x9  Art Gallery of Hamilton (catalog) touring in Canada

1981  The Heritage of Jack Bush  Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa (catalog)

1981  Toronto-New York  Art Toronto 81 (catalog)

1982  The Threshold of Color  The Edmonton Art Gallery

1983  Update: Cranbrook  Robert Kidd Gallery, Birmingham, Detroit

1984  Triangle international Artsists’ Workshop  Pine Plains, N.Y. (catalog)

1985  Abstraction x 4  Canada House, London, (curated and catalog essay by Karen Wilkin) travelling to Bonn (IFA Gallery) and Paris (The Canadian Cultural Centre)

1986  Toronto-3  Eva Cohon Gallery, Chicago

1986  Contemporary Candian Artists  Wade Gallery, Los Angeles

1987  New Abstractions  Shippee Gallery, New York

1991  Moffett’s Collection  Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale

1991  The Big Picture  Gallery Camino Real, Boca Raton

1991  The New Acrylic Painters  Center for the Arts, Vero Beach, Florida

1992  The New Acrylic Painters  Gallery One, Toronto

1992  New New Painting  Galerie Gerald Piltzer, Paris (book-catalog, essays by Kenworth Moffett and Marcel Paquet)

1993  New New Painting  Musee des Beaux Art, Charleroi, Belgium

1993  New New Painting  Musee d’art Moderne et Contemporain, Nice, France

1993  New New Painting  Stadtishe Galerie, Goppingen, Germany (catalog)

1993  Discovery ’93  Grand Palais, Paris

1993  New New Painting  International Art Fair, Chicago

1993  Konfrontationen  Museum of Modern Art, Foundation Ludwig, Vienna (catalog)

1993  New New Painting  Galerie Tilly Haderek, Stuttgart

1993  New New Painting  Art Cologne ’93

1994  New New Painting  International Art Fair, Frankfurt

1994  New New Painting  International Art Fair at the Pier, New York

1994  New New Painting  Art 1994 (International Art Fair) Chicago

1994  Seda cihla  (Czech artists, exile) Klatovy, Bohemia (catalog)

1994  Hidden Values  Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax, travelling to Ontario and Alberta

1994  New New Painting  Salander-O’Reilly Gallery, New York

1994  New New Painting  Gallery ISM, Seoul, (catalog)

1996  New New Painting  Vanderleelie Gallery, Edmonton

1996  New New Painting  Gallerie Gerald Piltzer, Paris

1996  Annual Fall Exhibition  The Edmonton Contemporary Artists’ Society

1996  New New Painting  Art 2000, Stamford, Connecticut (catalog, essay by Donald Kuspit)

1997  New New Painting  Performing Center, Stamford, Connecticut

1997  New New Painting  York College, Queens, New York

1997  New New Painting  Museum of Contemporary Art, Lake Worth, Florida

1997  Colors: Contrast and Cultures  The Discovery Museum, Bridgeport, Conn.

1999  New New Painters  Flint Institute of Art, (catalog, essay by David Carrier)

1999  New New Painters  Denver Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver

2000  New New Painters  Stadthuise, Brussels

2000  New New Painters-the Real Avantgarde  Armory, New York (organized by Kenworth Moffett at the site of 1913 Armory Show, catalog)

2001  New New Painters  Galerie Anne Letree, Paris

2001  The Clement Greenberg Collection  The Portland Art Museum. Oregon (catalog)

2001  Ten Years of New New Painters  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto

2001  Tondo Rondo  C.W.White Gallery, Portland, Maine

2002  New New Painters  National Gallery, Prague, (large scale survey of NNP, catalog with essays of five international critics, 120 pages)

2003  Gallery Artists  Moore Gallery, Toronto

2004  Gallery Artists  Moore Gallery, Toronto

2005  Gallery Artists  Moore Gallery, Toronto

2007  New Acrylic Abstraction  Salt Lake Art Center, Utah, U.S.A.

2008  Gallery Artists  Moore Gallery, Toronto

2009  Six New New Painters  Museum of New New Painting, Toronto

2010  Toronto Art Fair  Lausberg Contemporary, Toronto

2011  Winter Thaw  Lausberg Contemporary, Toronto

2012  Toronto Art Fair  Lausberg Contemporary, Toronto

2015  Nikola Rukaj Gallery  Toronto

2015  Toronto Art Fair  Nikola Rukaj Gallery, Toronto

2017  Twenty-Five Years of New New Painters  Museum of New, Toronto

2020  Joseph Drapell & Henry Saxe  13th Street Gallery, St. Catharines, Ontario CANADA

2022  Thirty Years of New New Painters  Museum of New, Toronto

PUBLIC ART:

1968  Life  outdoor sculpture 12 x 65 x 6 feet, concrete and plexiglas, commissioned by Ben’s Bakery, Halifax, Nova Scotia (on Wikipedia)

1986  Film Power  7 x 25 feet, mural for Cineplex Odeon, Toronto

2009  North Wind  9.5 x 18 feet, acrylic on canvas with holographic additives, Metro Toronto Convention Centre

DRAPELL IN PRINT:

Many articles and reviews of Drapell’s art have been published. The essential essays are by Ken Carpenter (1978, 1980, 1988, 1990, 2011, 2014, 2022), Karen Wilkin (1983, 1986), Kenworth W. Moffett (2005), Roald Nasgaard (2007), Walter Klepac (2014)

2020  Nude Ascending  includes an essay by Matthew Kyba