(Chronology, Selected Exhibitions and Public Collections) Edward Biberman (1904 - 1986)

1904 – Born in Philadelphia, PA

1920 – First becomes serious about oil painting while recovering from a broken leg

1921 – Graduates high school and enrolls in the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce at the University of Pennsylvania (Wharton)

1924 – Graduates from Wharton with a business degree and enrolls in the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (PAFA) – studies with Arthur Carles and Henry McCarter

1926 – Graduates from PAFA and leaves for Paris and Concarneau, France

1927 – Attends Grande Chaumiére; summers in Concarneau; associates with a coterie of French and expatriate artists, including Calder and Noguchi; exhibits at the Salon d’Automne, Grand Palais, Paris

1929 – Exhibits at the Salon des Independants, Paris; first solo exhibitions at Galerie Zak, Paris, and Neue Kunsthandlung Gallery, Berlin; returns to Philadelphia and Mt. Desert, Maine, before settling in New York

1930 – Exhibits at the Museum of Modern Art, An Exhibition of Work of 46 Painters and Sculptors Under 35 Years of Age; represented by Montross Gallery, New York; spends the summer in the American Southwest where he meets Georgia O’Keeffe, John Marin and Paul Strand and paints with Marion and Grace Greenwood; paints portrait of Martha Graham - first of a series of portraits of prominent Americans, which over the next forty years includes: Martin Luther King (collection of LACMA), Lena Horne (collection of the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institute), Dashiell Hammett (collection of the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institute), Linus Pauling, Paul Robeson, Aldous Huxley, Ailes Gilmour, Joan Crawford, Katherine Cornell, Luise Rainer, Herbert Biberman and Gale Sondergaard

1931 - Exhibits at PAFA (also 1932 and 1953); solo exhibition at Montross Gallery, New York (also 1932); during summer, returns to Monument Valley, Utah

1932 – Exhibits at the Museum of Modern Art, Murals By American Painters and Photographers; solo exhibitions Crillon Galleries, Philadelphia, and the Chicago Art Club, Chicago

1933 – Solo Exhibition Reinhardt Galleries, New York (also 1936)

1934 – Exhibits at the Whitney Museum of American Art (also 1936 and 1937), the Salons of America, New York’s Municipal Art Exhibition (also 1938) and with the College Art Association at the Dallas Art Museum; solo exhibitions at Mellon Galleries and Boyer Galleries, Philadelphia

1935 – Solo exhibition at Stendahl Art Gallery, Los Angeles (also 1936)

1936 – Moves to Los Angeles, in part to be closer to his film director brother, Herbert, and his actress sister-in-law Gale Sondergaard; solo exhibitions at Stanley Rose Galleries, Los Angeles and Courvoisier Gallery, San Francisco; participates in group exhibition of the American Artists Congress, Stanley Rose Gallery, Los Angeles (also 1937)

1937 – Solo exhibition at Howard Putzel Gallery, Los Angeles (also 1938); Gale Sondergaard wins the First Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Anthony Adverse

1938 – Exhibits at the Foundation of Western Art, Los Angeles (also 1940, 1943 and 1944); American Artists Congress Gallery (also 1939); marries Sonja T. Dahl; receives commission from the Treasury Department Section of Fine Arts for the mural Los Angeles: Prehistorical and Spanish Colonial at the Los Angeles Federal Courthouse (installed January 1939)

1938 – 1970s – Teaches at the Art Center School (Art Center College of Design), Pasadena, CA (1938 –1950); into the 1970s, also teaches as part of UCLA’s extension program

1939 – Exhibits in All California Exhibition, Painting, Sculpture, Los Angeles Museum at the Los Angeles County Museum (LACMA) (also exhibited at LACMA 1942, 1943, 1944, 1950, 1954, 1955, 1956); Golden Gate International Exposition (California Art Today Section), San Francisco, CA

1940 – Receives second mural commission from the Treasury Department Section of Fine Arts for Creative Man for the Los Angeles Post Office (installed 1941); receives third mural commission from the Treasury Department of Fine Arts for Abbot Kinney and the Story of Venice for the Venice, California Post Office (installed 1941)

1941 – Solo exhibition at Raymond & Raymond Galleries, Los Angeles (also 1946 and 1947); solo exhibition at Associated American Artists Galleries, New York

1941 – 1945 – Artistic output decreases during World War II as Biberman focuses on activities to support the war effort

1946 – Returns to painting more actively; completes first Sepulveda Dam paintings

1947 – Herbert Biberman becomes the subject of investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee; Edward Biberman delivers paper, The Attack on American Art, presented at the Beverly Hills Hotel, in connection with a conference on “Thought Control in the United States”; solo exhibition at

Hartwell Galleries, Los Angeles, CA

1950 – First retrospective of twenty-five years of paintings held at Fraymart Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; as a member of the “Hollywood Ten,” Herbert Biberman sentenced to prison for contempt of Congress (serves five months); Edward Biberman stops painting to work on his brother’s release

1953 – First book on Biberman’s art, The Best Untold: A Book of Paintings by Edward Biberman is published; solo exhibition at Chabot Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

1958 – 1967 - Solo exhibitions at Silvan Simone Gallery, Los Angeles; Whittier Art Gallery, Wittier Art Association, Whittier, CA; Alvord Room, Monrovia Library, Monrovia, CA; The Heritage Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; ACA Galleries, New York; George Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; and Jewish Community Center, San Diego, CA

1964 – Audio Interview with Betty Hoag for the Archives of American Art New Deal and Arts Project

1965 – First of ten works enters LACMA’s collection

1968 – Second book on Biberman’s art, Time and Circumstance, Forty Years of Paintings by Edward Biberman is published; hosts twenty-episode nationally syndicated television series, Dialogs in Art, produced in cooperation with KNBC, UCLA and LACMA with artist guests including Charles White, Millard Sheets, June Wayne and Emil Kosa, Jr., among others; solo exhibition at Beverly Hills Women’s Club, Beverly Hills, CA

1971 – First museum retrospective, Edward Biberman Retrospective Exhibition, at the Palm Springs Desert Museum, Palm Springs, CA and the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

1972 – Solo exhibition, The Graphic Work of Edward Biberman, University of Judaism, The School of Fine Arts, West Coast School of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, Los Angeles, CA; first represented by Gallery Z (representation continues)

1974 – Solo exhibitions at the Rancho Santa Fe Art Center, Rancho Santa Fe, CA and Gallery Z, Beverly Hills, CA (also 1976, 1978, 1981, 1984, etc.)

1975 – Audio interview with Emily Corey as part of Los Angeles Art Community: Group Portrait, under the auspices of the Oral History Program University of California Los Angeles, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities (last interviews conducted in 1976); videotape Interview concerning mural projects, as part of New Deal Art Video Collection, NEW funded project at the de Saisset Museum, Santa Clara University, CA

1976 – Exhibits in New Deal Art in California, de Saisset Museum, Santa Clara University, CA

1978 – KNBC produces and broadcasts At One with Edward Biberman, a 42-minute discussion with the artist about his life and work

1979 – Solo exhibition, Edward Biberman Paintings Since 1971, Palm Springs Desert Museum, Palm Springs, CA

1981 – Solo exhibition, Homage to Los Angeles (retrospective), at the Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA

1985 – National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institute, Washington, D.C., purchases portraits of Lena Horne and Dashiell Hammett

1986 – Dies in Los Angeles

1994 – Solo exhibition, Silence in the City: Edward Biberman’s Los Angeles at the Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach, CA

1997 – Exhibits in When Artists Became Workers: The People’s Art Movement of the ‘30s & ‘40s, Works by Jewish Artists in California Collections, Judah L. Magnes Museum, University of California, Berkeley, CA

1999 – Exhibits in Paul Robeson: Artist & Citizen 1898-1976, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institute, Washington, D.C.

2000 – LACMA exhibits four works in Made in California: Art, Image and Identity, LACMA, Los Angeles, CA

2002 – Exhibits in Americans, National Portrait Gallery, London, England

2003 – Solo exhibition, Edward Biberman’s LA at the Pasadena Museum of California Art, Pasadena, CA; exhibits in A Brush with History, Paintings from the National Portrait Gallery, International Gallery of the Smithsonian’s S. Dillon Ripley Center, Washington, D.C.

2007 – Feature length documentary released, Brush with Life: The Art of Being Edward Biberman

2009 – Solo exhibition, Edward Biberman Revisited, at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2011 – Solo exhibition, The Art of Edward Biberman, LACMA, Los Angeles, CA; exhibits in To Make A World George Ault and 1940s America, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC; exhibits in Civic Virtue: The Impact of the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery and the Watts Towers Art Center, part of the Pacific Standard Time exhibition series, Municipal Art Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; exhibits in Celebrating Pacific Standard Time: 1945 – 1980 at the Galleries of American Jewish University, Los Angeles, CA

2014 – Focused exhibition, Edward Biberman, Abbot Kinney and the Story of Venice, at LACMA, Los Angeles, CA; solo exhibition, Lost Horizons: Mural Dreams of Edward Biberman, LACMA in partnership with SPARC at the Duron Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2018 – Exhibits in Contraption: Rediscovering California Jewish Artists at the Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco, CA

2020 – Exhibits in Los Angeles Area Scene Paintings, Hilbert Museum of California Art, Chapman University, Orange, CA

2022 – Exhibits in Black American Portraits, LACMA, Los Angeles, CA; exhibits in Alone Together – Encounters in American Realism, The Westmoreland Museum of American Art, Greensburg, PA

2023 – Exhibits in Art for the People WPA Paintings from the Dijkstra Collection, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA; Oceanside Museum of Art, Oceanside, CA; and The Huntington Library, Art

Museum and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, CA

Public Collections

National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institute, Washington, DC; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California; Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio; Museum of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Houston, Texas; Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, California; Palm Springs Art Museum, Palm Springs, California; University of California Irvine Institute and Museum of California Art, Irvine, California; De Saisett Museum, Santa Clara, CA; Orange County Museum of Art, Santa Ana, CA; Hilbert Museum of California Art, Orange, CA; Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach, CA; Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art, Logan, Utah; Portland Library, Portland Oregon; Stanford University Library,

Palo Alto, CA; Triton Museum of Art, Santa Clara, CA