Lois Dodd

Lois Dodd (*1927, Montclair, New Jersey) lives and works in Maine, Delaware Water Gap and New York City, USA. She studied textile design at Cooper Union in New York City, US (1945 – 1948). From 1971 to 1992, she taught at Brooklyn College and Showheagan Gallery.

In 1952, Lois Dodd founded Tanager Gallery with her former husband Bill King as well as the artists Angelo Ippolito, Charles Cajori and Fred Mitchel. Tanager Gallery became part of what is known as the 10th Street Galleries, which were co-operative galleries in New York’s East Village in the 1950s and 1960s. Dodd’s work was exhibited for the first time at Tanager Gallery in 1962.

Contrary to the dominant artistic trends of the time such as abstract expressionism, minimal art or pop art, Dodd developed her own specific visual language. Her oeuvre, whose motifs are mainly based on observations of landscapes, nudes and still lives, is neither impressionistic nor expressionistic, but verging on realism. Dodd is not a landscape painter in the classical sense, since she does not look at her subjects from a distance, but often from an intimate proximity, revealing complexity in apparent simplicity. Her paintings rarely depict entire scenes; instead, they are often cropped to show only one aspect of a landscape or a moment. For example, she precisely examines plants and flowers without lapsing into a botanical classification. Another recurring theme is the view from an inside to an outside, and the window as a screen of projection. Her works are never dazzling, pretentious or excessive. One possible interpretation of her work is that it contains a quiet critique of the relentless belief in progress, consumerism and possessiveness held by some of her contemporaries. 

Lois Dodd has had numerous institutional solo exhibitions including at The Hall Art Foundation, Reading, Vermont; Trenton City Museum at Ellarslie Mansion, Trenton, MJ; Ogunquit Museum of Modern Art, Ogunquit, Maine; Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO; Portland Museum of Art, Portland, ME. She has also been part of a variety of group exhibitions (selection): Hall Art Foundation, Derneburg Castle; Kanohah Museum of Art, Katonah, NY; National Academy Museum and School, New York, NY; Visual Arts Center, Summit, New Jersey; Nassau County Museum of Arts, New York.

Collections (selection): Bowdoin College Art Museum, Brunswick, Maine, Brooklyn College of CUNY, New York; Bryn Mawr College Drawing Collection, Pennsylvania; Colby College Collection, Waterville, Maine; Cooper Hewitt Museum, New York, New York; Dartmouth College Art Museum, Hanover, New Hampshire; Farnsworth Art Museum, Hanover, New Hampshire; Farnsworth Art Museum of Art, Knoxville, Tennessee; Museo dell’Arte, Udine; Whitney Museum Print Collection, New York, New York.

1927

Born / geboren in Montclair, New Jersey, USA

Lives and works / lebt und arbeitet in Maine, Delaware Water Gap and New York City, USA

Education / Ausbildung

1945 – 1948

Cooper Union, New York City, USA

Selected Solo Exhibitions


2023

Upcoming: Retrospective survey, Kunstmuseum den Haag, Netherlands

“Lois Dodd: Natural Order,” Bruce Museum, Greenwich, CT

“Lois Dodd: Natural Order,” Hall Art Foundation, Reading, VT

2022

Lois Dodd | Natural Order, The Hall Art Foundation, Reading, Vermont

2020

Painting the Moon: Lois Dodd and Friends, Trenton City Museum at Ellarslie Mansion, Trenton, NJ

Light of Day, Westbeth Gallery, New York

Lois Dodd, Night Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Lois Dodd/Shara Hughes, Parts and Labor, Beacon, NY

Lois Dodd, Adams and Ollman Gallery, Portland, OR

2019

Modern Art, London

Lois Dodd: Flashings, Philipp Haverkampf Galerie, Berlin

2018

Lois Dodd: Paintings and Drawings, Ogunquit Museum of Modern Art, Ogunquit, Maine

Lois Dodd: Flashings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Lois Dodd, National Arts Club, New York, New York

2017

Lois Dodd: Early Work, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Lois Dodd: Windows and Reflections, List Gallery, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, PA

Lois Dodd: Windows, OMI International Arts Center, Ghent, New York

2016

Lois Dodd: Day and Night, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2015

Lois Dodd: Recent Panel Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2014

Lois Dodd: Recent Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2013

Lois Dodd: Selected Panel Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2012 – 2013

Lois Dodd: Catching the Light, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO, travels to Portland Museum of Art, Portland, ME, 2013

2012

Lois Dodd, University Galleries at CCSU, New Britain, CT

Lois Dodd: New Panel Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2011

Lois Dodd: Shadows, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Lois Dodd: Naked Ladies, Natural Disasters and Puzzling Events, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

2010

Lois Dodd: Second Street Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2009

Lois Dodd: Fire, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2008

Lois Dodd: Landscapes and Structures, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Lois Dodd: A Retrospective, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockport, Maine

Lois Dodd: An Exhibition of 14 Works on Paper, Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts, Old Lyme, Connecticut

2007

Lois Dodd: Paintings and Drawings, Southern Methodist University, Pollock Gallery, Dallas, Texas

Lois Dodd: Paintings, Reynolds Gallery, Richmond, Virginia

2006

Lois Dodd: Recent Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Lois Dodd: Works on Paper, June Fitzpatrick Gallery, Portland, Maine

Lois Dodd: A Pure Landscape, The Fine and Performing Arts Center at Western Carolina University, Cullowhee, North Carolina

2004

Four Seasons in Maine: Lois Dodd’s Small Plein-Air Paintings, Twentieth- Century Gallery, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine

Flashings: Small Paintings on Aluminum, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Lois Dodd: Small Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2003

Nudes in the Landscape, New York Studio School, New York, New York Traveled to: Banana Factory, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania Jaffe-Friede Gallery, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire and Daura Gallery, Lynchburg College, Lynchburg, Virginia

Windows and Doorways: Three Decades of Paintings, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Selected Small Paintings, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

2001

Lois Dodd: Paintings, Kingsborough Community College, Brooklyn, New York

Women at Work, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

Kingsborough Community College Art Gallery, Brooklyn, New York

Lois Dodd: Mind the Gap, Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

2000

The Woods: Selected Paintings from the 1970s, Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

1999

Flower Paintings, Fischbach Gallery, New York, New

1998

Lois Dodd: Eclipse and Other Night Paintings, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

1996

Lois Dodd: 25 Years of Painting, Organized by Montclair Art Museum, Montclair, New Jersey and Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York; Traveled to Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine; Trenton City Museum, Trenton, New Jersey

1995

Paesaggio Gallery, West Hartford, Connecticut

Big Work Little Work, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

1994

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

Painter’s Painting, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

1993

Small Paintings: Flashings, Roundtop Center for the Arts, Damariscotta, Maine

1992

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

Lois Dodd: Paintings- View of Windows and Doors, Rider College Gallery, Lawrenceville, New Jersey

1990

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire

1988

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

1987

Anne Weber Gallery, Georgetown, Maine

1986

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

1984

Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana

1983

Cape Split Place, Addison, Maine

1982

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

1981

New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, New Jersey

1980

Lyman Allyn Museum, New London, Connecticut

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

1979

Selected Paintings 1969-1979, Cape Split Place, Addison, Maine

1978

Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

1977

Colby College, Waterville, Maine

Cape Split Place, Addison, Maine

1976

Green Mountain Gallery, New York, New York

1974

Green Mountain Gallery, New York, New York

1973

Thomas College, Waterville, Maine

1971

Green Mountain Gallery, New York, New York

1970

Green Mountain Gallery, New York, New York

1969

Green Mountain Gallery, New York, New York

1962

Tanager Gallery, New York, New York

1961

Tanager Gallery, New York, New York

1958

Tanager Gallery, New York, New York

1957

Tanager Gallery, New York, New York

1954

Tanager Gallery, New York, New York

Selected Group Exhibitions

2020

Lois Dodd and Sharif Farrag, Adams Ollman Gallery, Portland, Oregon, US

Lois Dodd and Shara Hughes, Parts and Labor, Beacon, NY, US

2019 – 2020

Für Barbara (bis), curated by Leo König, Hall Art Foundation, Schloss Derneburg, Germany

2019

Downtown Painting, curated by Alex Katz, Peter Freeman, Inc., New York, NY

LandEscape: New Visions of the Landscape from the Early 20th and 21st Centuries, Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, NY

Techniques of the Observer, Greene Naftali, New York, New York

2018

Snow, Hal Brom Gallery, Hotel Fauchere, Milford PA

Lois Dodd and Roger Winter, National Arts Club, New York, New York

Cliché, Almine Rech Gallery, New York, New York

Summer Exhibition, Jack Henly Gallery, New York, New York

Painting Now and Forever Part III, Matthew Marks Gallery, New York, New York

2017

Inventing Downtown, Artist-run Galleries in New York City, 1952-1965, Grey Art Gallery, New York University, New York, New York

2016

2016 deCordova Biennial, deCordova Museum, Lincoln, Massachusetts

Sheldon Invitational, Sheldon Museum of Art, Lincoln, Nebraska

The Female Gaze, Part Two, Chiem & Read, New York, New York

2015

2015 Annual Exhibition, National Academy Museum and School, New York, NY

2014

Women Who Choose Women Again, Visual Arts Center, Summit, New Jersey

Garden Party, Nassau County Museum Of Art, Roslyn, New York

2013

Come Together: Surviving Sandy Year, Industry City, Sunset Park, Brooklyn, New York

Abstractions Masquerading as Landscape, Museum of Grand Junction, Colorado

2012

Reflections- Zeuxis Exhibitions, Lindenwood’s J. Scheidegger Center for the Arts, St. Charles, MO

2011

Garden As Muse, Walton Arts Center, Fayetteville, Arkansas

2010

Viewpoint, Reynolds Gallery, Richmond, Virginia

Paint Box Leaves: The Autumnal Landscape from Cropsey to Wyeth, Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, New York

Long Long Gone, Leo Koenig, Inc., New York, New York

2008

Here’s the Thing: Single Object Still Lifes, Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, New York

2007

Art of the Gettysburg Review: Representation in Contemporary American Painting, Schmucker Art Gallery, Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

Night Vision: Printing Darkness, Center for Contemporary Printmaking, Norwalk, Connecticut

Selected Work By Gallery Artists, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

2006

Five Landscape Paintings, University of Maine Museum of Art, Bangor, Maine

Fluid Fields, The Painting Center, New York, New York

The Maine Print Project: Celebrating 200 Years of Printmaking in Maine, Maine Center for Contemporary Art, Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine

The Figure in American Painting and Drawing 1985-2005, Ogunquit Museum of American Art, Ogunquit, Maine

The Landscape of Golf, Newport Art Museum, Newport, Rhode Island

Got Cow? A Celebration of Bovine Bounty, The Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, New York

2005

The Long View: Selections from the Norma B. Marin Collection of Maine Art University of Maine Museum of Art, Bangor, Maine

A Sense of Place: New Jersey, The Noyes Museum of Art, Oceanville, New Jersey

100 New York Painters, Long Island University, Brooklyn, New York

Water, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockport, Maine

Summer Landscapes, Alexandre Gallery, New York, New York

Paint on Metal: Modern and Contemporary Explorations and Discoveries, Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, Arizona

7th Annual Art Auction, National Academy School of Fine Arts, New York, NY

Transforming the Page: Lines, Washes, and Smudges, National Academy Museum, New York, New York, 2004-05

2004

Watercolor, DFN Gallery, New York, New York

The Artist Eye, curator Wolf Kahn, National Academy of Design, New York, NY

Artists Talk: Five Years, Lyme Academy, Lyme, Connecticut

Industrial Beauty, George Billis Gallery, New York, New York

2003

Rockland Harbor, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

178th National Academy of Design Member Exhibition, New York, New York

Lyrical Landscapes, Widener Gallery, Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut

Holiday Salon, Paesaggio Gallery, West Hartford, Connecticut

2002

New York City: Some Different Views, Caldbeck Gallery, Rockland, Maine

The Founding Five of Tanager Gallery, David Findlay Jr. Fine Art, New York

Selections, Paesaggio Gallery, West Hartford, Connecticut

Plein-Air Paintings, C.W. White Gallery, Portland, Maine

Lois Dodd and Elizabeth O’Reilly, List Gallery, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania

2001

Plein Air: Eric Aho, Lois Dodd, Emily Nelligan, Stuart Shils, Paesaggio Gallery, Canton, Connecticut

Invited, First Street Gallery, New York, New York

2000

Remembering Rudy, Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York, New York

1998

Recent American Portraits, Sherman Gallery, Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts

1995

National Academy Members Exhibition, New York, New York

50’s – 60’s Selected Paintings, Fischbach Gallery, New York, New York

Animals, Animals, Anita Shapolsky Gallery, New York, New York

1994

Trees, Midtown Payson Gallery, New York, New York

46th Annual Academy – Institute Purchase Exhibition, American Academy- Institute of Arts & Letters, New York, New York

1993

Men Working, G.W. Einstein Gallery, New York, New York

45th Annual Academy – Institute Purchase Exhibition, American Academy- Institute of Arts & Letters, New York, New York

1992

Through a Glass Darkly, First Street Gallery, New York, New York

The Maine Muse, Paesaggio Gallery, Hartford, Connecticut

44th Annual Academy – Institute Purchase Exhibition, American Academy- Institute of Arts & Letters, New York, New York

Recent Acquisitions, Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine

1991

The Artist in the Garden, National Academy of Design, New York, New York

43rd Annual Academy – Institute Purchase Exhibition, American Academy- Institute of Arts & Letters, New York, New York

1990

Forty-Second Annual Purchase Exhibition, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, New York, New York

165th Annual Exhibit, National Academy of Design, New York, New York

Voyages of the Modern Imagination, Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine

1989

June Moon, Einstein Gallery, New York, New York

Landscapes, Greenwald and Marin, New Hope, Pennsylvania

Drawings From Life, Research Foundation, CUNY, New York

Contemporary Plein Air Landscape, Tatistcheff Gallery, Santa Monica, California

1988

Vision and Tradition, Morris Museum, Morristown, New Jersey and Colby College, Waterville, Maine

Contemporary Nudes, 1 Penn Plaza, New York, New York

Landscape Anthology, Borgenicht Gallery, New York, New York

The Face of the Land, Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art, Loretto, Pennsylvania

1987

The Artist and the River, Kemerer Museum, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania

American Art Today, The Portrait, The Art Museum of Florida International University, Miami, Florida

Director’s Invitational, Maine Coast Artist’s Gallery, Rockport, Maine

162nd Annual Exhibition, National Academy of Design, New York, New York

1986

Paintings and Sculpture by Candidates for Art Awards, The American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, New York, New York

1985

Horse, Ammo, Brooklyn, New York

The Gathering of the Avant-Garde, the Lower-East Side 1948-1970, Kenkeleba House, New York, New York

Figural Art of the New York School: Selections from the Ciba-Geigy Collection, Baruch College Gallery, New York, New York

Green Mountain Retrospective, First Half, Blue Mountain Gallery, New York, New York

1984

Masters of Classical Realism, Allen Preibe Gallery, University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh

The Spirit of the Coast, Monmouth Museum, Lincroft, New Jersey

The First Eight Years, Artist’s Choice Museum, New York, New York

1983

Works by Artists in the Historical Archives of the Women’s Interart Center of New York City, Philadelphia College of Art, Pennsylvania

Tanager Gallery, 1952-1962, Bueckner and Harpsichord, New York, New York

Painted Light, Artist’s Choice Museum, New York, New York, and tour

1982

Painterly Realism, Rahr-West Museum, Manitowac, Wisconsin

Painterly Landscape, Jersey City Museum, Jersey City, New Jersey

1981

Eight With Nature, Landmark Gallery, New York, New York

1980

Image in Landscape: The Last Decade, University of New Hampshire, Durham, New Hampshire

1979

Painterly Realism in America, A.J. Wood Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

1978

American Realism, William and Mary College, Williamsburg, Virginia

Survey of Realism, Sordoni Gallery, Wilkes College, Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania

Painterly Realism, Watson, deNagy Gallery, Houston, Texas

The Landscape: Different Points of View, Wave Hill, Riverdale, New York

Contemporary Landscapes: Broad Vista and Distant Perspectives, Roanoke Fine Arts Center, Virginia

1977

Figurative Art in New York, Indiana University Art Museum, Bloomington, Indiana

Ten Painters of Maine, Landmark Gallery, New York, New York

American Realists, Clark-Benton Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico

Magic Circle, Bronx Museum, Bronx, New York

Brooklyn College Art Department- Past and Present 1942-1977, Robert Schoelkopf Gallery, New York, New York

1976

Maine ’76, Maine State Museum, Augusta, Maine

Artists for Environment Exhibit, Walpack Center, New Jersey

1975

Dodd, Gelber, Groell, Sewall Art Gallery, Rice University, Houston, Texas

1974

Works by Women from the Ciba-Geigy Collection, Michigan State University and University of North Carolina

The Eye of Woman, Hobart and William Smith, Geneva, New York

Annual Contemporary Painting Show, Randolph Macon Women’s College, Lynchburg, Virginia

Soho and So, Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania

Member’s Gallery Exhibition, Albright-Knox Museum, Buffalo, New York

New Images, Queens Museum, New York, New York

1973

Childe Hassam Purchase Exhibition, American Academy Institute of Arts and Letters, New York, New York

A Sense of Place, traveling exhibition to Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, South Dakota and Nebraska

1972

Twentieth Annual Exhibition, Museum of Art of Ogunquit, Maine

Women in the Arts, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin

The Mind’s Eye, Green Mountain Gallery, New York, New York

Women Choose Women, New York Cultural Center, New York, New York

1971

Ciba-Geigy Collection, Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, New York

New England Landscapes, Fleming Museum, Burlington, Vermont

Homage to the Tanager, Roko Gallery, New York, New York

1970

Bowery Gallery, New York, New York

First Street Gallery, New York, New York

Painterly Realism, American Federation of Arts, traveled exhibition

Green Mountain Group, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania

1967

Ithaca College Museum of Art, Ithaca, New York

1965

Drawings, Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana

Drawings, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Eighteen Painters, selected by Fairfield Porter, Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, New York

1964

Drawings and Watercolors, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut

1962

Out of Doors Landscape, Kornblee Gallery, New York, New York

1961

Tanager Group, American University, Washington, D.C.

1960

Artisti Americani Residenti a Roma, Palazzo Venezia, Rome, Italy

1959

Art USA, New York Coliseum, New York, New York

1958

Stable Annual, Stable Gallery, New York, New York

1953

Dodd-Katz, Tanager Gallery, New York, New York

The Accent Gallery, Lakewood, Maine

1949

Pyramid Gallery, New York, New York

Selected Museum Collections

Bowdoin College Art Museum, Brunswick, Maine

Brooklyn College of CUNY, Brooklyn, New York

Bryn Mawr College Drawing Collection, Pennsylvania

Colby College Museum, Waterville, Maine

Cooper Hewitt Museum, New York, New York

Dartmouth College Art Museum, Hanover, New Hampshire

Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine

Kalamazoo Art Center, Kalamazoo, Michigan

Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, Tennessee

Museo dell’Arte, Udine, Italy

The Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York

National Academy of Design, New York, New York

National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C.

The Ogunquit Museum of American Art, Ogunquit, Maine

Portland Museum of Art, Portland, Maine

Springfield Art Museum, Springfield, Missouri

Wadsworth Athenaeum, Hartford, Connecticut

Whitney Museum Print Collection, New York, New York

Grants and Awards

2015

Maine in America Award, Farnsworth Art Museum

2007

Juried New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture Exhibition

From Governors Island: The 2007 Alumni Exhibition

Benjamin West Clinedinst Medal, Artists’ Fellowship

2005

Augustus St. Gaudens Distinguished Alumni Award, Cooper Union

2004

Honorary Degree Old Lyme Academy

1991

American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, Hassam, Speicher, Betts and Symons Purchase Prize

1990

National Academy of Design—Henry Ward Ranger Purchase Award

1987

Cooper Union Distinguished Alumni Citation

National Academy of Design—Leonilda S. Gervas Award

1986

American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Award

1971

Ingram Merrill Foundation Grant

1962

Longview Foundation Purchase Award

1959 – 1960

Italian Government Study Grant

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