Harold Frank Estate Paintings

Harold Frank (1917-1995)

Harold Frank was raised in the tenements of New York and exhibited a talent for drawing at an early age. After a stint in the army, he traveled to Paris to study and returned to New York in the 50’s. He attended the New York Art Students League, the National Academy of Design, Pratt Institute, Chouinard Art Institute and UCLA where he was a colleague of Richard Diebenkorn, who had a lasting influence on his work. Other artists who deeply affected his creative philosophy included Matisse, Rouault, Picasso and De Kooning.

“I can live with the abstract. Life is a mystery.”

His he was shown internationally in London, Paris, Amsterdam and Aubonne, Switzerland, as well as throughout the United States from the 1960’s through the 80’s. Major awards also came his way (among them the Adolph and Clara Obrig Award and the Sudam Silver Medal from the National Academy of Design; the National Watercolor Society’s Grumbacher Award; the John Marin Memorial Award in the Watercolor U.S.A. Show and a First Prize from the Laguna Beach Museum of Art).

“Sometimes I work on three or four things at a time. I need large pots of paint with brushes and acrylic paint. I might, for example, have three cans of white paint of varying degrees of thickness. Once I came across a can of brown paint which had to have been fifteen years old. It was almost acidified. It was beautiful and I used the hell out of it.”

“I use a fluid and fast brush stroke. My paints are wet. I draw while I paint like Soutine did. As I get caught up in a painting, there seems to be a chemical change–I feel a shortness of breath, an excitement. This is the exuberance of creativity. It is passionate, impulsive. Sometimes I should stop. My body cries out, ‘Stop, stop,’ but I say, ‘No, no, I cannot stop.”
Harold Frank

Education:
National Academy of Design, New York, 1936; Art Students League, New York, 1937; Pratt Institute< Brooklyn, New York; Chouinard Art Institute, Los Angeles; University of California, Los Angeles.

Selected One-Man Exhibitions:
Savage Gallery, London, England, 1960; Galerij Werking, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1960; Ardail-Castro Gallery, Paris, France, 1960; Pasadena Art Musuem, Pasadena, California, 1962; Ryder Gallery, Los Angeles, California, 1964; Ankrum Gallery, Los Angeles, California, 1964; Gallerie Chantepierre, Aubonne, Switzerland, 1966; Haggenmmaker Gallery, Beverly Hills, California, 1966; Irene Neuman Galleries (with Ernest Halpern), Los Angeles, California, 1968; Emerson Gallery, Encino, California, 1973; Otis Art Institute, Los Angeles, California, 1977; Chester House Gallery, Chester, Vermont, 1977; L’Atelier Gallerie, Carmel, California, 1978; Upstairs Downstairs, Laguna Beach, California, 1979; International Student Center, UCLA, 1984; Robert Zehil Gallery, Beverly Hills, California, 1986; Front Porch/Human Arts Gallery, West Los Angeles, California, 1987; Soho Gallery, Studio City, California, 2002 (first posthumous exhibition).

Selected Group Exhibitions:
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, 1959 ;National Water Color Society Traveling Exhibition, 1965-1968, 1971-1973; San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego, California, 1966; Municipal Art Gallery (Barnsdall Park), Los Angeles, California, 1969; KCET Television Auction, Los Angeles, California, 1968, 1969; Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena, California, 1971, 1972; Water Color USA, 1968, 1970, 1971, 1973, 1974, 1980; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, Virginia, 1970, 1975; Springfield Art Museum, Springfield, Missouri, 1977-1979; Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio, 1977-1979; William Grant Still Community Arts Center, “Artists Against Hunger,” Los Angeles, California, 1985; Otis Art Institute, Los Angeles, California, 1988; Salander-O’Reilly Galleries, Beverly Hills, California, 1992.

Selected Awards:
John Marin Memorial Award, Watercolor USA, 1968; Honor Award, University of Judaism, School of Fine Arts, Los Angeles, California, 1969; Certificate of Merit, National Academy of Design, New York, 1975 All California Show, Laguna Beach Museum of Art, Laguna Beach, California, 1976; Grumbacher Award, National Watercolor Society, 1976; The Adolph and Clara Obrig Prize, National Academy of Design, New York, 1977, 1978; Miles Blatt Award, National Watercolor Society, 1979; Certificate of Merit, Watercolor USA Honor Society, 1986.