Freddy Rodríguez (artist)

Freddy Rodríguez (born 1945) is an American artist born in the Dominican Republic who has lived and worked in the United States since 1963. Much of his work takes the form of large hard-edge geometric abstractions. His paintings have been widely exhibited and are held in several important collections.

Freddy Rodríguez
Born1945 (age 75–76)
Santiago de los Caballeros, Dominican Republic
NationalityAmerican
EducationArt Students League of New York

New School for Social Research

Fashion Institute of Technology
OccupationArtist
AwardsPainters & Sculptors Grant, Joan Mitchell Foundation, 1995

Creating a Living Legacy, Joan Mitchell Foundation, 2013 Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship, 2016

New York Community Trust—Oscar Williams & Gene Derwood Award, 2020
Websitehttp://freddyrodriguez.com

Life

Freddy Rodríguez was born in Santiago de los Caballeros in the Dominican Republic in 1945.[1] He comes from a family of artists.[2] Rodríguez immigrated to the United States in 1963 at the age of eighteen.[3] In New York he spent much time at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where he was particularly interested in the work of Piet Mondrian.[1] He studied painting at the Art Students League of New York and The New School, and obtained a degree in textile design from the Fashion Institute of Technology.[4] In the 1980s he joined with several other Dominican visual artists including Bismark Victoria, Eligio Reynoso, Magno Laracuente and Tito Canepa to form the "Dominican Visual Artists of New York." This group succeeded in obtaining sponsorship for exhibitions of Dominican Art in popular locations.[5] In 1991 the New York Foundation for the Arts named him "Gregory Millard Fellow in Painting". In 1992, he was an NYSCA Artist in Residence at El Museo del Barrio.[2]

Work

Rodríguez was influenced by Rembrandt, Paul Cézanne and Piet Mondrian. His style incorporates elements of Abstract Expressionism, Pop and Minimalism.[1] In 2011 the Smithsonian American Art Museum acquired three of his early works, painted in the early 1970s. Tall and narrow, the abstract paintings named Danza Africana, Amor Africano and Danza de Carnaval represent the energy of Dominican music through vibrant colors and zigzagging lines.[3] A reviewer has discussed the political messages in his work, mourning the impact of colonialism and subsequent dictatorships on the original Caribbean paradise, saying, "The political messages are subsumed by the artist's desire to create beautiful paintings fusing Renaissance and modern traditions. Integrating illusionistic space with flattened surfaces, and contrasting loose and tight brushstrokes, the artist enters a dialogue with centuries of art concerned with these same pictorial issues."[6]

Exhibitions

Rodríguez has exhibited widely in museums, galleries, biennials, and art fairs. In 1994, Rodríguez's work was shown as part of the American contingent at the IV Bienal Internacional de Pintura en Cuenca, Ecuador. Other American artists exhibiting at this show were Donald Locke, Philemona Williamson, Whitfield Lovell and Emilio Cruz.[7]

Selected Solo Exhibitions
  • 1974: Freddy Rodríguez. Museo del Hombre Dominicano, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • 1975: 2da Exposición Individual: Freddy Rodríguez. Casa de Teatro, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • 1976: Mil imágenes Plus.... Casa de Teatro, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • 1978: Freddy Rodríguez. Cayman Gallery, New York
  • 1980: El Retorno. Casa de Teatro, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • 1982: Freddy Rodríguez. Cayman Gallery, New York
  • 1983: Corazón, Magia y Terruño. Voluntariado de las Casas Reales. Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • 1986: El Paraíso: Desde el Descubrimiento Hasta la Colonizacion: Cimarrones y Otras Cosas. Boynayel Galería de Arte. Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • 1989: Paraíso/Paraíso. Virginia Miller Galleries, Coral Gables, Florida
  • 1990: Queens 1990. Queens Museum of Art, Flushing, New York
  • 1990: Paradise. Scott Alan Gallery, New York
  • 1992: Terra Nostra. Fredric Snitzer Gallery, Coral Gables, Florida
  • 1993: Vienen Por Las Islas (1493) / They Come for the Islands (1493). Aljira, A Center for Contemporary Art, Newark, New Jersey
  • 1996: Priest: The Spirit and the Flesh. Jersey City Museum, Jersey City, New Jersey
  • 1999: En esta Casa Trujillo es el Jefe. Jersey City Museum, Jersey City, New Jersey
  • 2005: America’s Pastime: Portraits of the Dominican Dream, Works by Freddy Rodríguez, Newark Museum, Newark, New Jersey
  • 2009: Portrait of the Artist as an Immigrant/Portrait of an Immigrant as an Artist. Gabon Foundation, New York
  • 2013: Impredecible/Unpredictable. Instituto Cervantes, Tokyo, Japan
  • 2015: Freddy Rodríguez: My Geometries 1970-2002. Longwood Art Gallery, Hostos Center for the Arts and Culture, Bronx, New York
  • 2019: La Fiebre del Oro, Museo Ralli Santiago, Santiago, Chile
  • 2019: Freddy Rodríguez: Five Decades of Geometry. Diálogos. Isabella Hutchinson Modern. Frieze Art Fair, New York
  • 2020: Freddy Rodríguez: Early Paintings, 1970-1990. Hutchinson Modern and Contemporary, New York

Selected group exhibitions
  • 1971: New Images-West Side. Goddard-Riverside Community Center, New York
  • 1972: Contemporary Latin American Painters. Loeb Student Center, New York University, New York
  • 1973: Contemporary Reflections: Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, Connecticut
  • 1974: XIII Bienal de Artes Plásticas. Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • 1982: Sacred Artifacts, Objects of Devotion. Alternative Museum, New York
  • 1983: 13-Uptown. Noel Fine Art, Bronxville, New York
  • 1983: Queens Artist. Ollantay Gallery, Jackson Heights, New York
  • 1983: Works on Paper: Second Annual Juried Exhibition. Queenborough Community College, Bayside, New York
  • 1984: Mira! The Canadian Club Hispanic Art Tour. El Museo del Barrio, New York; San Antonio Museum of Art, San Antonio, Texas; Plaza de la Raza, Los Angeles, California.
  • 1984: Dominican Visual Artists of New York. City Gallery, New York
  • 1984: Hispanic Artists in New York. Macy Gallery, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York
  • 1984: Third Latin American Graphics Biennial. Cayman Gallery, New York
  • 1984: Latin American Art. Montclair State College, Upper Montclair, New Jersey
  • 1985: Spotlight on New Abstractions. Shippe Gallery, New York, New York
  • 1986: Regional: A Hispanic Invitational Art Exhibition. The Arthur Ross Gallery, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
  • 1991: Art Miami 91. Miami Beach Convention Center, Miami Beach, Florida
  • 1991: Il Sud Del Mondo: L’Altra Arte Contemporanea. Galleria Civica D’Arte Contemporanea, Marsala, Sicily, Italy
  • 1993: Current Identities: Recent Painting in the United States. Museum of Contemporary Art, Panama City, Panama
  • 1994: Paper Visions V: A Biennial Exhibition of Works on Paper by Contemporary Latin American Artists. Housatonic Museum of Art, Bridgeport, Connecticut
  • 1991: Awakening. Discovery Museum, Bridgeport, Connecticut
  • 1994: IV Bienal de Pintura, Cuenca, Ecuador; and Cucalón Gallery, New York, New York
  • 1996: Modern and Contemporary Art of the Dominican Republic. Americas Society, New York, New York; and Bass Museum, Miami, Florida
  • 1997: Art in Transit; A Dominican Experience. INTAR Latin American Gallery, New York
  • 1997: Talk Back! The Community Responds to the Permanent Collection, Part II. The Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx, New York
  • 1998: Three Caribbean Artists. James Howe Fine Arts Gallery, Kean University, Union, New Jersey
  • 1998: New York State Biennial. New York State Museum, Albany, New York
  • 2001: The Political is the Personal:  Perspectives from the Latin American Diaspora. The College Art Gallery, The College of New Jersey, Ewing, New Jersey
  • 2003: L Factor. Exit Art, New York
  • 2005: My Island, My Home/ Mi Isla Mi Hogar. The Long Island Museum, Stony Brook, New York
  • 2006: Merengue! Visual Rhythms/Ritmos Visuales. El Museo del Barrio, New York
  • 2006: This Skin I'm In: Contemporary Dominican Art from El Museo del Barrio's Permanent Collection. El Museo del Barrio, New York
  • 2007: Cardinal Points/Puntos Cardinales: A Survey of Contemporary Latin and Latin American Art from the Sprint Nextel Art Collection. Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christie, Texas
  • 2007: Sugar Buzz. Lehman Collage Art Gallery, Bronx, New York
  • 2007: The Players. The Arsenal Gallery in Central Park, New York, New York
  • 2007: Upon Further Review: Looking at Sports in Contemporary Art. Rockland Center for the Arts, West Nyack, New York
  • 2008: Nos vemos en el play!...Béisbol y Cultura Dominicana. Centro León, Santiago, Dominican Republic
  • 2010: Duodecad = 12. Edge Zones Art Center, Miami, Florida
  • 2011: Colorforms. Praxis Gallery, Miami, Florida
  • 2011: Interstices and Emphasis. Aljira, A Center for Contemporary Art, Newark, New Jersey
  • 2012: Creating A Living Legacy. CUE Art Foundation, Presented by Joan Mitchell Foundation. Diálogo 365. City Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
  • 2013: Our America: The Latino Presence in American Art. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
  • 2014: Caribbean Art at the Crossroads of the World. Perez Art Museum, Miami, Florida
  • 2014: Flow: Economies of the Look and Creativity in Contemporary Art of the Caribbean. Inter-American Development Bank Headquarters, Washington DC
  • 2014: If You Build It. Sugar Hill, New York, New York
  • 2015: Thinking in Spanish. The Puffin Foundation, Teaneck, New Jersey
  • 2016: Tyranny’s Tear: Mending a Dominican Trauma. BronxArtSpace, Bronx, New York
  • 2016: Resilience: Reclaiming History and the Dominican Diaspora, Inter-American Development Bank, Washington, DC
  • 2016: Fifth Bronx Latin American Art Biennial. Longwood Art Gallery, Bronx, New York
  • 2018: Bordering the Imaginary: Art from the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Their Diasporas. BRIC, Brooklyn, New York
  • 2018: Recent Acquisitions. National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC
  • 2018: The Sidewalk of the Americas. Inter-American Development Bank Annual Meeting, Mendoza, Argentina
  • 2018: Revival: Pattern and Decoration. Longwood Art Gallery, Bronx, New York
  • 2021: Latinx Abstract. BRIC, Brooklyn, New York

References
Citations
  1. Anreus 2008.
  2. New York City...
  3. Ramos 2012.
  4. Alegría & Ruffinelli 1990, p. 240.
  5. Zakrzewski Brown 1999, p. 174.
  6. Alegría & Ruffinelli 1990, p. 96.
  7. Lovell & Lippard 2003, p. 119.
Sources
  • Abalos, David T. (1998). La Comunidad Latina in the United States: Personal and Political Strategies for Transforming Culture. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 117. ISBN 978-0-275-95892-3. Retrieved 2012-08-10.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Alegría, Fernando; Ruffinelli, Jorge (1990). Paradise Lost Or Gained?: The Literature of Hispanic Exile. Arte Publico Press. ISBN 978-1-55885-037-8. Retrieved 2012-08-10.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Anreus, Alejandro (2008). "Freddy Rodríguez". Freddy Rodriguez. Retrieved 2012-08-10.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Freddy Rodriguez". ArtSlant. Retrieved 2012-08-10.
  • Lovell, Whitfield; Lippard, Lucy R. (2003-03-01). The Art of Whitfield Lovell: Whispers from the Walls. Pomegranate. p. 119. ISBN 978-0-7649-2447-7. Retrieved 2012-08-05.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. "Freddy Rodriguez". Retrieved 2012-08-10.
  • Ramos, E. Carmen (July 3, 2012). "Preparing for Our America: Music and Abstraction, Works by Freddy Rodríguez". Eye Level. Smithsonian American Art Museum. Retrieved 2012-08-10.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Smithsonian American Art Museum (2011). "Participant bios for Encuentros: Artistic Exchange between the U.S. and Latin America" (PDF). Retrieved 2012-08-10.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Zakrzewski Brown, Isabel (1999). Culture and Customs of the Dominican Republic. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 174. ISBN 978-0-313-30314-2. Retrieved 2012-08-10.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)

Further reading
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