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256:, but also shares with the latter a modernist's assumption that the life of a waitress or working man is as deserving of our attention as any saint. The waitress is carried heavenwards—held aloft means of an eggbeater caught in her hair—by a partially nude angel, whose method of propulsion is a whirlygig rather than wings.
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This combination of careful observation, juxtaposition, fantastical elements, often nude woman portrayed in scenes with clothed men, triumphal arches are all rendered in a curiously flat, highly charged and exquisitely colored dreamscape-like settings are like glimpses of a private world, rendered
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conceived in the form of a
Renaissance altarpiece, except that its central figure is a factory worker and not a saint. Flanking this central figure are smaller scenes of ordinary people—at a picnic, in a parlor, on a farm and in the schoolroom. Meticulously painted in oil on composition board in a
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After a solo exhibition of her paintings in Boston in 1951, Sharrer did not have another solo show until 1969. After another eighteen years she had a 1987 solo exhibition that traveled from New York City to the
Memorial Art Gallery (Rochester, NY) and the Danforth Museum (Framingham, MA).
283:(September 29, 2017 – January 7, 2018). As their curator explains, the painting came in part from Sharrer's interest in examining the intersection of myth and the celebrity culture that surrounded Presley and other popular entertainment figures in the early 1960s.
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While often included in group shows in those intervening periods, and although she worked continuously and diligently on her art, she was often overlooked as "modern art" came to be seen as synonymous with
152:. The "Fourteen Americans" show at the Museum of Modern Art, while often thought to proclaim the arrival of abstract expressionism did not do so unambiguously since it included those like Sharrer and
245:. So powerful was this association that MoMA had to name its show in 2000 (in which Sharrer was included) as "Modern Art despite Modernism," as if the latter were synonymous with the former.
180:, Sharrer did not take the turn to abstract expressionism and continued to paint in a figurative and academic style, although the content of her work was often mordantly witty. The term
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Despite her meticulous technique, luminous color palette, and eye for telling detail reminiscent of
Flemish painters, she was a modernist in sensibility and subject. A painting like
228:, a prominent historian of Europe. They lived and worked in New York, Amherst, Montreal, London, Rochester, NY and Charlottesville, VA. They had one son, Adam Zagorin, born 1953.
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there. Her mother, the former
Madeleine Sachs, was also a painter. Sharrer was reared in the Philippines, Paris and in several American cities before graduating from
117:, the finished work is more than six feet long and three feet high and took her five years to complete. It was the subject of a 2007 retrospective at the
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in print, produced for her show at
Spanierman April 18-May 11, 2002. See also Perez Zagorin, "Oral History" (2002) for additional biographical details.
263:, from 1963. It is one of Sharrer's earlier forays into surrealism, featuring three somewhat oddly proportioned figures, two of which are based on
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267:'s parents, while the third, a Renaissance-like, golden-haired nude young woman, represents Sharrer's take on the ancient Greek myth of
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are standing just behind. In the background are two triumphal obelisks flanking an almost Dali-esque clock, presumably the clock at
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A full chronology for Honoré Desmond
Sharrer's career can be found in Sharrer, (New York: Spanierman Gallery, 2002), 39-40.
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Honoré Desmond
Sharrer was born at West Point, N.Y. Her father, Robert Allen Sharrer, was an Army officer attached to the
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104:(July 12, 1920 – April 17, 2009) was an American artist. She first received public acclaim in 1950 for her painting
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2000: Prize for
Outstanding Accomplishment in Painting, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, NY
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At 18, she was chosen out 230,000 applicants to win a national graphic arts Youth Forum prize sponsored by
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Perez
Zagorin, "Oral History" (2002), an interview conducted Laura MacCarthy on behalf of the Smithsonian
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transformed himself into a swan in order to seduce a beautiful woman. The painting is displayed at the
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1981: Lillian
Fairchild Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Arts, University of Rochester, NY
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See the reproductions of paintings, documents, studies and sketches on the Smithsonian web site
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1978: Childe Hassam Purchase Prize, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, NY
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1971: Childe Hassam Purchase Prize, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, NY
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252:(1984), displays a sly humor in its choice of subject matter that hearkens back to her
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305:. In the foreground is a beautifully rendered silver ewer, a known Monticello objét.
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in which a female nude wearing headphones reclines with one red pump on and one off.
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524:, (New York: Spanierman Gallery, 2002). It includes essays by Linda Nochlin and
429:, Vol. 2, 113, who thinks the show was badly curated because of these tensions.
396:"Tribute to the American Working People | Smithsonian American Art Museum"
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One of her largest paintings (9 x 6 feet) is a surreal oil on canvas, entitled
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A Dangerous Woman: Subversion & Surrealism in the Art of Honoré Sharrer
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132:(1943) was included in the legendary 1946 "Fourteen Americans" show at the
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After an earlier marriage that ended in divorce, in 1947 Sharrer married
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http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/oralhistories/transcripts/zagori07.htm
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441:"Honoré Sharrer, 88; Painted 'Tribute to the American Working People'"
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221:, she worked as a welder in shipyards in California and New Jersey.
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1951: Norman Waite Harris Medal and Prize, Art Institute of Chicago
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1987: Award for Outstanding Achievement in Visual Arts, National
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Unlike many of her New York contemporaries including Motherwell,
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who are not modernists based on the litmus test of abstraction.
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and George Tooker is often used to describe her later work.
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http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=78465
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Now in the collection of MoMA, gift of Lincoln Kirstein:
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in Northampton, Massachusetts, as part of the exhibition
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Equally enigmatic is another of her late paintings,
309:for us by the artist to make of them what we will.
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412:. A second painting, and the first parts of the
370:Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
128:She first received public notice when her work
121:and is part of the permanent collection of the
184:applied to other American painters including
163:were featured in the March 20, 1950 issue of
372:Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, MA
113:style and color palette reminiscent of the
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106:Tribute to the American Working People
376:Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
334:Prize, National Academy of Design, NY
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597:21st-century American women painters
592:20th-century American women painters
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358:Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, NY
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587:San Francisco Art Institute alumni
378:University of Virginia Art Museum
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572:People from West Point, New York
491:"ART IN REVIEW; Honoré Sharrer"
354:Danforth Museum, Framingham, MA
123:Smithsonian American Art Museum
577:Painters from New York (state)
557:21st-century American painters
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360:Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY
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198:United States Military Academy
35:Honoré Sharrer, photograph by
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489:Glueck, Grace (2002-05-03).
439:Fox, Margalit (2009-05-12).
16:American painter (1920–2009)
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528:. This is the closest to a
374:University of Rochester, NY
366:San Diego Museum of Art, CA
277:Smith College Museum of Art
215:San Francisco Art Institute
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602:The Bishop's School alumni
356:Estate of Lincoln Kirstein
352:Columbus Museum of Art, OH
250:Resurrection of a Waitress
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465:Archives of American Art.
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204:in La Jolla, California.
159:Sharrer and her painting
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136:in New York, curated by
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339:Women's Caucus for Art
243:abstract expressionism
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138:Dorothy Canning Miller
102:Honoré Desmond Sharrer
23:Honoré Desmond Sharrer
368:Sarah Roby Foundation
289:A Dream of Monticello
210:The American Magazine
130:Workers and Paintings
134:Museum of Modern Art
58:West Point, New York
425:Clement Greenberg,
416:were shown as well.
332:Gladys Emerson Cook
202:The Bishop's School
530:catalogue raisonné
495:The New York Times
445:The New York Times
261:Leda and the Folks
192:Life and education
364:Newark Museum, NJ
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148:(sculpture), and
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348:Collections
271:, in which
186:Paul Cadmus
178:Mark Rothko
546:Categories
526:Erika Doss
508:2021-05-23
450:2018-09-20
382:References
303:Monticello
50:1920-07-12
503:0362-4331
217:. During
110:polyptych
78:Education
95:Painting
414:Tribute
254:Tribute
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330:1984:
313:Awards
291:(1996)
60:, U.S.
537:here
520:See
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66:Died
44:Born
232:Art
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