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Artist Ross Bleckner. COURTESY THE CHURCH
Ross Bleckner “Here is the Ocean, This is Moonlight,” 2021. Oil on linen, 96" x 72" x 2." COURTESY THE CHURCH
On Thursday, May 5, at 6 p.m., The Church in Sag Harbor will host artist Ross Bleckner in conversation with artist and The Church co-founder Eric Fischl. The two artists will have a lively discussion about “Here Is the Ocean, This Is Moonlight,” Bleckner’s 2021 work featured in the current “Empire of Water” exhibition.
Bleckner has evoked emotion and elegy in his abstract work since the 1980s, and has addressed with great compassion the AIDS epidemic, loss itself and the passage of time. Fischl and Bleckner have remained good friends since meeting at Cal Arts in the 1970s.
Ross Bleckner was born in New York City and raised in Hewlett, N.Y. He received a Bachelor of Arts from New York University in 1971, a Master of Fine Arts from Cal Arts in 1973, and he has taught at many of the nation’s most prestigious universities. He is currently a professor in the graduate program at NYU Steinhardt. During his career Mr. Bleckner has exhibited throughout the United States and internationally at venues such as SFMoMA, the ICA Philadelphia, Kunsthalle Zuriche, Moderna Museet in Stockholm, and many others. In 1995 the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York held a major retrospective of his works. For 10 years Bleckner served as the president of the AIDS Community Research Initiative of America, a non-profit community-based AIDS research and treatment center. In 2009 he was awarded the title of Goodwill Ambassador by the United Nations for his work helping to rehabilitate child soldiers in northern Uganda.
Tickets for the talk are $15. The Church is at 48 Madison Street, Sag Harbor. For more information visit thechurchsagharbor.org.
Staff Writer on May 2, 2022