Biography

The art of Sonia Gechtoff has its roots in the San Francisco school of abstract expressionism. Though Gechtoff has shifted from the sweeping, gestural style that characterized her work in the 1950s, the movement’s influence still rings strongly in her paintings and drawings, which suggest landscape imagery as they explore the vibrant rhythms and energy of the natural world. Consistent with her abstract expressionist origins, Gechtoff relies on confidently abstracted images in order to capture the aesthetic and emotional qualities of the natural environment.

Born in Philadelphia in 1926, Gechtoff was the daughter of Russian-born artist Leonid Gechtoff, who encouraged her artistic development by allowing her to paint beside him in his Philadelphia studio. Though stylistically removed from her father’s expressionist landscape painting, Gechtoff’s work, particularly that created in recent decades, often incorporates similar aesthetic interests. Gechtoff pursued her B.F.A. at the Philadelphia Museum School of Art and after graduating in 1951, moved to the Bay Area, where she enrolled in a lithography class at the California School of Fine Arts and quickly became affiliated with the San Francisco school of abstract expressionism. Although she began as a social realist in the vein of Ben Shahn, Philip Evergood, and Max Beckmann, Gechtoff dramatically shifted her style in 1952 after meeting Ernest Briggs, an abstract expressionist who was also a student at the school. Seduced by the San Francisco style, Gechtoff began to use richly textured paint and a reductive palette to create large-scale abstractions that became increasingly suggestive of landscapes during the mid-1950s. In 1957 Gechtoff secured a position teaching at CSFA. In 1958 she moved with her husband, painter James Kelly, to New York City, where she continued to paint in an abstract mode that recalled her background as a West Coast abstract expressionist. In the 1960s and 1970s, however, she moved away from the gestural paintings that characterized her early work in favor of more tightly controlled graphite drawings.

Since the 1970s, Gechtoff has increasingly focused her artistic energies on capturing the lyrical, geometric forms found in nature. Although she has not abandoned the use of paint, her handling of the medium has changed remarkably. Rather than building layers of impasto, Gechtoff spreads her pigment in a wash of color that provides a soft backdrop for her heavily penciled lines. In other works, such as Winged Moon (1998), paint is excluded entirely in favor of the dark expressive mark of graphite. Recalling her long-time interest in landscape, Winged Moon offers a subtle, yet accessible reference to the dynamism of the natural world. Here, the orb of the moon is suspended in a sea of energetic lines. The lines push outward and downward in a flickering, flamelike motion as if spinning the moon in a rapid counterclockwise direction. The hatchmarks of the flamelike fingers, together with the dense rendering of the lunar sphere, create a bold pattern of light and dark. The transitions from dark to light build abstracted patterns that emphasize and intensify the sensuous drama of the work. Gechtoff’s treatment of line in Winged Moon is confident. Assured in her decisions, she sets down heavy, determined markings that are at once calculated and organic. This work seems to orchestrate the marriage of freedom and form in order to deliver an evocative meditation on the intersection of art, nature, and expression. —L.W.

(SJMA Selections publication, 2004)


Born in Philadelphia in 1926, Gechtoff was the daughter of Russian-born artist Leonid Gechtoff. Beginning at an early age, Gechtoff’s father encouraged her artistic development by allowing her to paint beside him in his Philadelphia studio. Though stylistically removed from her father’s expressionist landscape painting, Gechtoff’s work, particularly that created in recent decades, often incorporates similar aesthetic interests. Having grown up in an artistically-inclined environment, Gechtoff pursued her B.F.A. at the Philadelphia Museum School of Art. After graduating in 1951 she moved to the Bay Area, where she enrolled in a lithography class at the California School of Fine Arts (now San Francisco Art Institute) and quickly became affiliated with the San Francisco School of Abstract Expressionism. Although she began as a Social Realist in the vein of Ben Shahn, Philip Evergood, and Max Beckman, Gechtoff dramatically shifted her style in 1952 after meeting Ernest Briggs, an Abstract Expressionist who was also a student at the school. Seduced by the San Francisco style, Gechtoff began to use richly textured paint and a reductive palette to create large-scale abstractions that became increasingly suggestive of landscapes during the mid-1950s. In 1957, Gechtoff secured a position teaching at CSFA, where she continued to work until 1958 when she moved with her husband, the painter James Kelly, to New York City. Following her relocation to the East Coast, Gechtoff continued to paint in an abstract mode that recalled her background as a West Coast Abstract Expressionist. However, beginning the 1960s and 1970s, she increasingly moved away from the sweeping, gestural paintings that characterized her early work in favor of more tightly controlled graphite drawings.

Since the 1970s, Gechtoff’s has increasingly focused her artistic energies on capturing the lyrical, geometric forms found in nature. Although she has not abandoned the use of paint, her handling of the medium has changed remarkably. Rather than building layers of impasto, Gechtoff spreads her pigment in a wash of color that provides a soft backdrop for her heavily penciled lines. In other works, such as Winged Moon (1998), paint is excluded entirely in favor of the dark expressive mark of graphite. Recalling her long-time interest in landscape, Winged Moon makes a subtle, yet accessible reference to the dynamism of the natural world. Here, the orb of the moon is suspended in a sea of energetic lines. The lines push outward and downward in a flickering, flame-like motion as if spinning the moon in a rapid, counterclockwise direction. The hatchmarks of the flame-like fingers, together with the dense rendering of the lunar sphere, create a bold pattern of light and dark. The transitions from dark to light build abstracted patterns that emphasize and intensify the sensuous drama of the work. Gechtoff’s treatment of line in Winged Moon is confident. Assured in her decisions, she sets down heavy, determined markings that are at once calculated and organic. Her work, therefore, seems to orchestrate the marriage of freedom and form in order to deliver an evocative meditation on the intersection of art, nature, and expression. (SJMA Collections Committee, 2004)



Interview with Sonia Gechtoff - NYC Artist: http://artsandcultureresearch.org/2012-Artists--Sonia-Gechtoff

My father was a painter originally from Odessa, Ukraine who traveled the world with my mother before I was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1926. He encouraged me to be a painter and had me sit beside him at his easel with a brush and paints and beginning at age six he was there to spur me on. When I came to San Francisco, California in 1951 I found the major turning point for my future life as a painter. From the academic approach to painting I learned in art school, I went to totally abstract work, particularly influenced by the paintings of Clyfford Still who had been a major force at the California School of Fine Arts just previous to my arrival. Although I never studied with him, I saw several wonderful examples of what he had been doing and that opened a door for me. My paintings are abstract with suggestions of architecture and nature and occasionally, the figure. During the last six months I have worked in a way similar to the energetic way I painted 50 years ago in San Francisco. Drawing is always as important to me as is painting and I look forward to documenting it all. My work is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, San Francisco MOMA, the Whitney Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and the Menil Collection, Houston, Texas, among many others. I have been exhibiting since 1948 and my most recent exhibition was of 1950s paintings at Nyehaus Gallery, NYC in 2011. The catalog of that show can be seen online at Nyehaus.com. There is also an interview by Faye Hirsch, Senior Editor at Art in America which can be seen online at ArtinAmerica.com. An article titled “Can We Still Learn to Speak Martian” by John Yau written for Hyperallergic, an online art magazine dated April 29, 2012 discusses my early work along with other Bay Area painters.

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