Jose Gurvich at Cecilia de Torres - New York, New York - Review of Exhibitions - Brief Article

Art in America, June, 1995 by Eduardo Costa

This show was a mini-retrospective of the work of Josb Gurvich, who was born in 1927 in Lithuania. When he was very young, his family emigrated to Uruguay. As a teenager he met Horacio Torres, son of Joaquin Torres-Garcia. They started a lifelong friendship, and Gurvich became a member of the seminal Torres-Garcia Workshop.

He started to paint around 1947, and a few paintings from these early years were on view. In them we see Gurvich's particular interest in faces, plus the Workshop's familiar orthogonal structure that conveys all forms on a horizontal/vertical scaffolding. As he continued to paint, a more personal, geometrical style developed. His brushstroke took on a gestural quality which energized the Constructivist grid.

Gurvich's still lifes, which are also geometric and quite abstract, were strongly represented in this exhibition. One of them shows the curious bas-relief technique he developed: the same objects were painted on two pieces of cardboard, then one set of objects was cut out, and each shape superimposed on its twin, thus creating a palpable sense of perspective and depth. The Workshop's symbolic motifs are frequent in Gurvich's work: the sun, the divine eye, the fish, the violin, Jacob's ladder, etc.

In 1954 Gurvich traveled to Europe and Israel, where he worked part-time as a shepherd and painted. Soon after, a mature figurative style appeared in his work, which was well represented in the exhibition. The geometric gesture gives way to undulating lines, which provide a new way of animating the surface. Gurvich used this technique in the backgrounds as well as inside the figures. His panoramic views of leaping villagers, animals and objects bring to mind both Bosch and Chagall. However, unlike Chagall, who worked rather loosely, Gurvich created compositions that are so tightly constructed "you cannot penetrate the paintings with a knife," as his fellow Workshop painters used to say. Among this group of works is a remarkable 1969 painting of a Russian pogrom, a narrative, realistic work that seems to be bathed in blood.

In 1970 Gurvich moved to New York, where he was commissioned to do several paintings on the themes of the Jewish holidays. Inspired by the resulting work, he started making versions for himself. While working on Zuccotz in 1974, he died of a sudden heart attack. The last brushstroke can be seen in the unfinished work, thinning out as he fell to the floor. That year, the Jewish Museum began plans for a Gurvich exhibition that, unfortunately, never materialized. Perhaps the initiative may be revived after this show, which built a considerable appetite for the 800 or so unknown works Gurvich left behind.