"Gottlieb's art, as it creates itself from moment to moment, through success, and through failure, offers an experience we cannot get in museums. It is the kind of experience that the future usually envies the past for–because the present usually waits for the ratification of original art, and for the artist himself to finish developing before it begins to interest itself in the activity that produced the art. The Jewish Museum has not waited, and I congratulate it for that."
–Clement Greenberg from the exhibition catalogue essay

In 1957, The Jewish Museum held an exhibition of Adolph Gottlieb's work that featured "a selection of paintings characteristic of his artistic development." The exhibition was accompanied by a catalogue essay written by art critic Clement Greenberg.

We invite you to learn more about this important exhibition that is highlighted here through a collection of photographs, documents, and press.

Shown: Installation images of Adolph Gottlieb at the Jewish Museum, New York, NY Nov. 17, 1957 - Dec. 31, 1957. (left) Artwork pictured (from left to right): Black Sun, 1952-1956, oil on canvas, 48 x 60 inches, Evil Omen, 1946, oil on canvas, 38 x 30 inches, Neuberger Museum of Art, Groundscape, 1956, oil and enamel on canvas, 84 x 144 inches.
(right) Artwork pictured (from left to right): Unstill Life III, 1954-56, oil on canvas, 84 x 192 inches, Museum of Modern Art, Oracle, 1947, oil on canvas, 60 x 44 inches.

"Gottlieb is among the very few artists left in New York whose work I can go to in the confident expectation that my sensibility will continue to be challenged and my taste to be expanded. The very difficulty of his art, and that it increases in difficulty, attests to the fact that the heroic age of American art is not yet over."
–Clement Greenberg from the exhibition catalogue essay

Reception of the Exhibition:

The exhibition was covered widely in the press. Below is a selection of articles written about the exhibition.

Shown: (left) C.B. ''Adolph Gottlieb'', Arts Magazine, December 1957. (right) P.T. ''Adolph Gottlieb'', Artnews, December 1957.

A review of the exhibition written by E. C. Goossen in the Monterey Peninsula Herald. Goossen states that Gottlieb "has the passion for exactitude and "thinks" about his pictures. This exactitude is a pre-requisite for the kind of paintings Gottlieb obviously wants to make; paintings about tension. Gottlieb is perhaps one of the first, and undoubtedly one of the most skillful manipulators of implied action, particularly in the way he extends it beyond the canvas."

In a March 1958 letter to Goossen, Gottlieb thanked him for his review saying, "Thanks for writing intelligently, on a high level, and for criticism in the best sense. This is something rarely seen in the art press."

Personal Letters:

Our archives hold many letters from friends congratulating Gottlieb on the success of his exhibition at The Jewish Museum.

Below is a letter sent to Gottlieb from his friend, the sculptor, David Smith, detailing his appreciation for the artist's recent exhibition at The Jewish Museum. Smith writes:

"This is a fan letter. Your show at the museum was great. It was excellently chosen and some of the 1957 works I had not seen, even better. I hope you get some great sales from it. For me, it was wonderful to see so many over the period. Seasons Greetings to you and Esther, David S and all of us."