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ALDEN MASON
Burpee Garden Revisited, 1973 - 1976
March 6 - March 29
Opening: March 6, 6:00 - 8:00 pm
ALDEN MASON
RAINBOW ROCKER, 1973
Oil on canvas
80 x 90 inches
In 1973, following the spectacular success of his first exhibition of
the Burpee Garden series of paintings at Seattle's Polly Friedlander
Gallery, Alden Mason visited New York at the invitation of Chuck Close.
Close, a former student of Mason, encouraged him to install a number
of his Burpee Garden paintings in Close's SoHo studio in the hopes of
finding a dealer in New York. Notably, Close arranged for the maverick
art dealer Allan Stone to view Mason's work.
Seeing the paintings Mason installed in Close's studio, Stone agreed to
buy all of them and to represent Mason’s work in New York. Two of the
paintings illustrated here are among those works Stone acquired and
held for the last thirty-five years. We are pleased to present them for the
first time in Seattle. In addition, we will show several Burpee Garden
paintings and watercolors for resale from local private collections.
ALDEN MASON
BURPEE SURPRISE PACKAGE, 1972
Oil on canvas
70 x 82 inches
Allan Stone showed Mason's paintings through the late 1970s, finding
an international market for the work. Some of the Burpee Garden
paintings were also shown to great acclaim at Ruth Schaffner Gallery in
Los Angeles and were acquired by museums and important collectors.
Burpee Garden paintings are represented in the collections of San
Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Denver Art Museum, Portland
Art Museum, Seattle Art Museum, Tacoma Art Museum, Museum of
Northwest Art in La Conner, WA and corporate and private collections.
ALDEN MASON
GOLDEN BURPEE, 1973
Oil on canvas
70 x 85
inches
The Burpee Garden series, named after the Burpee Seed Company
catalog which Mason remembered from his early years growing up on a
farm in the Skagit Valley, were the first of many triumphant innovations
as Mason's career progressed. With their audacious color, surprising
scale, and exuberant abstraction, they represent a break with the drably
colored or poetic narratives that had typified painting here following the
advent of the Northwest School. Mason's significance is obvious in the
way the Burpee Garden paintings mark a distinct turn in that linear
history. Along with other abstract artists working in Seattle such as
Michael Dailey, Robert Jones, William Ivey, and Frank Okada, Mason
influenced the development of many younger artists here. Despite
his need to abandon oil painting because of its detrimental effect on
his health, this short lived series of paintings remain the pinnacle of
Mason's early success.
In Seattle, Mason was represented by Greg Kucera Gallery from
1983 to 1996. He is currently showing work made since the 1980s at
Foster/White Gallery, where he has been represented since 2003. We
are pleased to work with Foster/White Gallery in presenting a broad
range of Alden Mason's work from the last four decades in our two
simultaneous exhibitions.
ALDEN MASON
BROWN BINGO, 1976
Oil on canvas
70 x 82 inches
Alden Mason's paintings
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