M.L.K. Jr.

Description

In the Carpathian Mountains of East Galicia in Austria, Chaim Gross grew up amid woodcutters, which set his ambition to become a sculptor. He came to the U.S. in 1921, settling in New York. There he studied at the Educational Alliance on the Lower East Side, where he met other artists such as Adolph Gottlieb, Moses and Raphael Soyer, and Ben Shahn. He also studied at the Beaux-Arts Institute of Design under Elie Nadelman, and later at the Art Students League with Robert Laurent.
As a mature artist he worked in wood, stone, and bronze, melding influences from Cubism, Surrealism, Non-Objectivism, as well as African and Northwest Coast Native American art. He also worked in other media such as printmaking and made designs for stained glass, ceramics, and synagogue doors. A figurative artist, his favorite theme was the female nude figure, especially the mother and child.
In 1968 he made a lithograph to memorialize Martin Luther King, Jr. The artist was watching television as the news of the assassination of the civil rights leader was announced. The Museum’s print records images that the artist saw as they appear on the T.V. screen; he combined them in a collage-like fashion with a portrait of King. Our print is from a small edition of 45.