Early Life and Work

He was born Gerald Gross to second generation Austrian-Jewish parents, Sidney and Jeanette Gross. The family moved to the suburbs (Kenmore and the town of Tonawanda, New York). An art teacher recognized his talent and recommended that he be enrolled at the Art Institute of Buffalo

Art Institute of Buffalo

The Art Institute of Buffalo was an art school in Buffalo, New York. It opened its doors in 1931, and continued to produce graduates until the Institute closed in 1956. The faculty included a number of well-known artists...

, which he attended from age seven until age eleven. (Neevel 2006, Eugene Weekly, p. 10)

His art teacher, a Mrs. Beagleman, favored an Impressionist style of painting, and she continued as his mentor until the Art Institute closed several years later. No institution was established to replace the Art Institute, and as a result Ross had no further formal training. (Eisenl 2001, The Torch, p. 10). Ross's work is influenced by the Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 I Macchiaioli

Macchiaioli

The Macchiaioli were a group of Italian painters active in Tuscany in the second half of the nineteenth century, who, breaking with the antiquated conventions taught by the Italian academies of art, did much of their painting outdoors in order to capture natural light, shade, and colour...

 and verismo

Verismo

Verismo was an Italian literary movement which peaked between approximately 1875 and the early 1900s....

schools of art. He has had exhibitions in Italy, Las Vegas, and Oregon.

Ross was also an influence on his younger sister, Diane (Diane Bush), who became an artist as well, and later a fine art photographer.

Activist Years

Following high school Ross studied at State University of New York at Buffalo

University at Buffalo, The State University of New York

University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, also commonly known as the University at Buffalo or UB, is a public research university and a "University Center" in the State University of New York system. The university was founded by Millard Fillmore in 1846. UB has multiple campuses...

. He became an activist opposed to the Vietnam War

Vietnam War

The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...

 (he was one of "the Buffalo Nine

The Buffalo Nine

The Buffalo Nine was a group of nine Vietnam War protesters arrested together on August 19, 1968 at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Buffalo, New York.- Background :...

" group of defendants), and worked on behalf of the political prisoner Martin Sostre

Martin Sostre

Martin Ramirez Sostre is an American activist.He served time in Attica prison during the early 1960s, where he embraced doctrines as diverse as Black Muslimism, Black Nationalism, Internationalism, and finally anarchism. In 1966 Sostre opened the Afro-Asian Bookstore in the black ghetto of...

 (Heineman 1993, p. 163). He was granted a B.A. in philosophy in 1968. (McQuiddy 2006, p. 76)

Described as "the big one that got away," the conservative press in Buffalo portrayed Ross as a Maoist and atheist who was "scurrilously critical of U.S. policies in Vietnam." The media indicated that the government may have deliberately targeted him and other anti-war leaders. According to the Buffalo media, Ross was a go-between for the Buffalo Nine and Martin Sostre, an important political prisoner in New York State whose case was of personal interest to J. Edgar Hoover, then head of the FBI. FBI efforts to draft Ross had failed because he had so many arrests for his anti-war activities that his court dockets never cleared long enough for the draft board to act. Also of interest to the FBI was the fact that Ross had been expelled from a Marxist-Leninist group, the Workers World Party (WWP), for "Kautskyism." (Cardinale 1998, p. 6)

Ross's unabashedly leftist and at times strident political position may seem at odds with his paintings, which are imbued with a sense of poetry and calm. Yet, his lifetime of opposing political systems that he believes deny basic human rights is deeply integrated into an artistic approach that expresses nobility in the human being and value in a nurturing environment. In life, Ross works for the utopia he creates in his work. Upon reflection, even his style may be seen to express a political statement. In his own words, "Only the elite have time to 'finish' paintings."

Life in Oregon

After graduation Ross moved to Arizona

Arizona

Arizona ; is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. It is also part of the western United States and the mountain west. The capital and largest city is Phoenix...

 and changed his surname to Ross. He later moved to Oregon

Oregon

Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...

 where he met his wife Angela Czyzewski at Ken Kesey

Ken Kesey

Kenneth Elton "Ken" Kesey was an American author, best known for his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , and as a counter-cultural figure who considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. "I was too young to be a beatnik, and too old to be a...

's Poetic Hoohaw in Eugene during the summer of 1977. His marriage to his first wife, Pamela Fore Tyree, of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, ended in divorce. Pamela died in Albuquerque, New Mexico in 2008.

Shortly afterward, Ross was juried into the New Zone Art Collective and helped to found the Downtown Initiative for the Visual Arts (DIVA) in Eugene, Oregon.

Recognized as a painter with vision and facility in a variety of painting styles, Ross was identified as one of a handful of truly mature artists inhabiting the artistic landscape of Eugene, Oregon, where he has now worked for over 25 years.(Keefer 2001, Eugene Register-Guard, pp. 1–2B. Another observer described Ross as a "master of portraiture." His talents are evident in the portrait of his wife Angela, entitled Arrivo a Bologna, which was considered one of his best: "subtle, tender, suggestive, spare in composition and palette." (Pederson 2005, Eugene Weekly, p. 29). This work has the unflinching directness that characterizes all of Ross's portraits, an approach that is aided by his tendency to choose models who themselves express confidence and strength.

In Oregon, Ross has created a home base where he continues to perfect his technique. He teaches in Eugene and maintains a studio where the craft of painting is as much his concern as his chosen subjects.

Arts Activism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_content
Featured content

As an arts activist in Eugene, Oregon

Eugene, Oregon

Eugene is the second largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon and the seat of Lane County. It is located at the south end of the Willamette Valley, at the confluence of the McKenzie and Willamette rivers, about east of the Oregon Coast.As of the 2010 U.S...

, Ross helped sustain the New Zone Art Collective for many years. The New Zone Gallery is today a not-for-profit tax-exempt cooperative gallery located in Eugene, Oregon, which emphasizes the work of its members. The gallery was established in 1983 to further, develop, and foster interest in experimental visual arts and to encourage artists with like interests. Ross worked to prevent loss of New Zone's tax-exempt status and to keep it alive online during a period of gallery homelessness.

In 1991, Ross helped found the popular Salon des Refuses art show. After his work was rejected from the annual Mayor's Art Show in Eugene, Ross planted an easel outside of the exhibition's reception as a gesture of public protest. He was joined by other artists whose works were similarly rejected and who ultimately formed their own alternative exhibition, the Salon des Refuses, which has been held every year since 1991. (McQuiddy 2007, p. 43)

Italian Connection

Ross and his wife Angela travel frequently to Italy, which continues to be the inspiration for many works. Early in the series of journeys to Italy, Ross came under the influence of the I Macchiaioli movement (Tuscany

Tuscany

Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....

).

By the early 1980s, Angela and Jerry Ross had become Italophiles. They made their first trip to Italy in 1991, attended a "Satellites in Education" conference in Bari, and then spent one month exploring both the popular destinations, such as Rome, Venice and Florence, as well as lesser known areas along the Adriatic and in the north. After their return, Angela continued university studies in Italian language and literature, during which time she and Jerry attended a lecture at the University of Oregon given by visiting professor Pier Cesare Bori, a leading Italian scholar on Russian philosopher/writer Leo Tolstoy. Eventually they became good friends with Bori who invited them to spend time in Italy at his writing study/apartment in Livergnano, Italy. Jarman 2000, p. 3) Known as "Liver and onions" to the GIs who fought there in WWII, Livergnano became Ross's home for three months in Summer, 1996. There he painted the landscape and portraits of the local inhabitants. After meeting some of the ex-GIs who were re-visiting battlefields, Ross eventually joined the 361st Infantry Battalion Association. He has attended their reunions and made videos interviewing survivors who had fought the Nazis in the Apennines. (Livengood 1994)
As a student of the philosophy and writings of the Italian philosopher, Antonio Gramsci, in June, 2002, Ross presented a paper, entitled "Global Technology Education in the Context of The Gramscian World View," before an international economics conference in Rome (Delener 2002, p. 1035) The conference was organized by the Global Business and Technology Association.

Ross's painting career began to take off in 1999 with an exhibition at the American Consulate in Milan

Milan

Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

, Italy. This was followed by a second show at the Consulate in 2000 and two more shows in Italy that year (Cafe Cabiria, Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

, Italy in Piazza S. Spirito and at the Municipio of the Comune di Loiano ((Bologna)). In 2001, Ross had a solo show in Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 at the prestigious Galleria d'Arte La Borgognona. He was also awarded a gold medal in a painting competition in Corsico, near Milan, along with an invitation to exhibit there in May, 2006.

In Italy, Ross has discovered an environment congenial to his style of painting. The age-old appreciation for painting in Italy and the Italian concept of verismo encourage him to paint in a manner that rings true. Ross's "discovery" of Italy has rewarded him as an artist. He is attracted to the time-honored tradition of the "veduta," views and cityscapes that express underlying messages about life and the quality of life. While he often chooses the wilder views not favored by "postcard painters," each of his subjects nevertheless reveals the mark of man, the evidence of human habitation and integration into the land.

Evolution of Painting Style

Ross's painting style has been influenced by Abstract Expressionism

Abstract expressionism

Abstract expressionism was an American post–World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve worldwide influence and put New York City at the center of the western art world, a role formerly filled by Paris...

, particularly the work of Willem de Kooning

Willem de Kooning

Willem de Kooning was a Dutch American abstract expressionist artist who was born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands....

 and Richard Diebenkorn

Richard Diebenkorn

Richard Diebenkorn was a well-known 20th century American painter. His early work is associated with Abstract expressionism and the Bay Area Figurative Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. His later work were instrumental to his achievement of worldwide acclaim.-Biography:Richard Clifford Diebenkorn Jr...

. This influence is revealed in his bold use of color and his expressive, experimental handling of pigment. His painterly style utilizes a technique borrowed from Francis Bacon

Francis Bacon (painter)

Francis Bacon , was an Irish-born British figurative painter known for his bold, austere, graphic and emotionally raw imagery. Bacon's painterly but abstract figures typically appear isolated in glass or steel geometrical cages set against flat, nondescript backgrounds...

 (mild distortions) but, as seen in the Portrait of Carlo Bianchi, it also references photography and computer imagery. Ross has also been influenced by Umberto Coromaldi

Umberto Coromaldi

Coromaldi , Umberto . He was born in Rome on Sept. 21. 1870, to Vincenzo Celli and Luisa.The mother was widowed shortly after his birth, then married the painter Filippo Indoni, who encouraged Coromaldi to paint. He then attended the Institute of Fine Arts in Rome, where he had as a teacher of...

 (Rome 1870-1948, Telemaco Signorini

Telemaco Signorini

Telemaco Signorini was an Italian artist who belonged to the group known as the Macchiaioli.He was born in the Santa Croce quarter of Florence, and showed an early inclination toward the study of literature, but with the encouragement of his father, Giovanni Signorini, a court painter for the...

 (Florence, 1835–1901), and most recently, Domenico Morelli

Domenico Morelli

Domenico Morelli was an Italian painter, one of the most important Neapolitan artists of the 19th century. He enrolled at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Naples in 1836. His early works are Romantic and contain imagery drawn from the Middle Ages and Byron...

 (Napoli, 1823–1901).

Ross works in a variety of moods—simple, elegant portraits; soft, earth-toned landscapes; and studies of historical work based on old master paintings. The latter are not literal copies but rather abstract compositions that "show the power of the old master's sense of composition and form." (Keefer 2005, pp. G3-G4) As time goes on, Ross is increasingly interested in scenes of contemporary working class life. He approaches such subjects without a shrill, messianic desire to foment action, but to work with the idea of expressing an abstract notion of social harmony. So, Ross's subject matter is strong, but restful, while his style and handling of paint convey a gestural energy that keeps each canvas lively.

Recently, Ross's emphasis has changed somewhat, demonstrating a greater interest in figurative work. Working quickly with an economy of expression, Ross has created multi-figure Italian beach scenes. These are related to his earlier old master studies. "In those paintings, the blocked-in compositions are borrowed—-'quoted' might be the correct postmodern term—-from classical European painting masters."
(Keefer 2007, pp. 1–2, Art Section). Beach paintings like Martinsicuo have provided Ross with an outlet for combining his interests in Italy and the human form.

Important Exhibitions

• 1988 New Zone Art Gallery—two-person show, group shows
• 1989 Hult Center, Mayor's Art Show -- Portrait of Oreshnikov
• 1991 Founding Salon des Refuses Show -- Portrait after Frans Hals
• 1994 Hult Center, Mayor's Art Show -- L.A. Rebellion
• 1995 Hult Center, Mayor's Art Show -- Portrait of Bob Devine
• 1999 Comune di Loiano, Italy (June 17-July 3)
• 1999 American Consulate in Milan, Italy
• 1999 Collier House (Faculty Club), University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon
• 2000 American Consulate in Milan, Italy
• 2000 Cafe Cabiria, Florence, Italy (Piazza S. Spirito)
• 2000 Comune di Loiano, Loiano (Bologna), Italy
• 2000 Mayor's Choice Award, Mayor's Show, Eugene, Oregon -- La Mamma
• 2001 Provenance Gallery, Eugene—solo show
• 2001 Jacob's Gallery -- Art in History, Science, and Culture
• 2001 31st Annual Willamette Valley Juried Show, Corvallis, Oregon
• 2001 Rome, Italy, Galleria d' Arte La Borgognona
• 2002 Rome, Italy, Galleria d' Arte La Borgognona
• 2003 Chetwynd-Stapleton Gallery, Portland
• 2003 Marghitta Feldman Gallery—solo show
• 2004 "Connections" Contemporary Arts Collective, Las Vegas, Nevada
• 2004 Barrios Cafe, Milan, Italy
• 2004 Salon des Refuses at DIVA -- Portrait of Carlo Giuliani
• 2005 Adam's Place and Luna's Jazz Center
• 2006 Le Loggia della Fornace, Rastignano, Italy -- Colori d'Europa
• 2006 Milano Opening Centro Foscolo, Comune di Corsico
• 2006 Comune di Loiano Sala Fantazzini di Loiano
• 2006 Mayor's Art Show, Eugene, Oregon
• 2006 Jacobs Gallery Eugene, Oregon
• 2007 The Springfield Museum, Springfield, Oregon—solo exhibition

Awards and recognitions

• Jerry Ross has been honored in Eugene, Oregon, with many local awards for his paintings, including Mayor's Art Show awards for La Mamma: Portrait of Stephania Mastrocinque and Vedova di Guerra: War Widow.

• In 2001, he received a Juror's Award at the 31st Annual Willamette Valley Juried Show in Corvallis, Oregon.

• In 1996, he came in second place in a painting competition held in Livergnano, Italy.

• In 2005, he won a gold medal and one-person show in Milan, Italy, as a result of a competition held in Corsico (Milan), Italy, sponsored by "Il gruppo cesare Frigerio."

• The Milan jurors wrote that Ross's work represented "un naturalismo di matrice novecentesca ed un cromatismo tonale di forte effetto plastico costruiscono un'atmosfera compostamente poetica" ("a sort of naturalism founded upon a twentieth-century matrix and a tonal type of chromatism with a strong, sculptural effect, to construct a composed, poetic atmosphere."

External links

• "Official Home Page for Artist"