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Ad Code: 3
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from Auction House Records.
Transitions, Sea to City (Port au Prince, Haiti)
Artwork images are copyright of the artist or assignee
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These Notes from AskART represent the beginning of a possible future biography for this artist. Please click here if you wish to help in its development:
|  Born on September 14, 1909. By 1930 Dempsey had settled in Oakland and was an employee of the Federal Art Project in 1934. He died in Takoma Park, Maryland on October 8, 1987. | Source:
Edan Hughes, "Artists in California, 1786-1940"
City Directory; Census; Social Security Death Index (1940-2002). | | Nearly 20,000 biographies can be found in Artists in California 1786-1940 by Edan Hughes and is available for sale ($150). For a full book description and order information please click here. |
Biography from Stella Jones Gallery:
| | Richard W. Dempsey was born in Ogden, Utah,
September 14, 1909. His youth was spent in Oakland, California where
he attended Sacramento Junior College (1929-31) as an art major and then
studied at the following institutions: The California School of Arts
and Crafts (1932-34) in Oakland, California; the Students Art Center
(1935-40). He held his first one-man exhibition in Oakland, 1935, then
headed for San Francisco where he held three exhibitions. In 1941, he
moved to Washington, D.C. to work as an engineering draftsman with the
Federal Power Commission.
Dempsey also studied at Howard
University in Washington, D.C. He studied sculpture with Sargent
Johnson, painting with Maurice Logan, Raymond Strong, Katherine Gans,
Edward Leslie, Sidney Lemos and lithography with James Wells. He also
worked as an engineering draftsman for the US government. In 1946,
along with Elizabeth Catlett, he was awarded a Julius Rosenwald
Fellowship for a series of paintings of outstanding American Negroes.
In 1951, he was awarded a Purchase Award in the Corcoran Gallery's
Tenth Annual Exhibition.
Dempsey was a
prolific painter and worked on as many as six canvases at one time,
switching as his moods changed. His paintings were highly influenced by
colors in his Caribbean environment, using them to express feelings of
emotions and dimension. His sensitivity to colors was heightened by
frequent trips to Jamaica and Haiti. With Dempsey, color, texture, and
form unite in his later abstract paintings to compose symphonic poems
for the eye of the beholder. |
| ** If you discover credit omissions or have additional information to add, please let us know at registrar@AskART.com. |
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