Born in Tahoka, Texas, in 1934, James received his first commission at the age of just 10 (to render a pair of horse’s heads!) After attending San Angelo High School and touring with the United States Marine Corps, he studied architecture at the University of Texas from 1956 to 1960. From 1960 to 1961, he studied art and sculpture at the university on a painting scholarship. With the encouragement of the architect Bruce Goff, he began to focus on painting. Moving to Los Angeles in 1962, he grabbed the attention of the art dealer Felix Landau, who had already introduced artists like Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Francis Bacon and David Hockney to the US art market. That same year, his ‘Marilyn Triptych’ artwork was added to the prestigious Museum of Modern Art’s permanent collection. He went on to be commissioned to paint the covers of famous titles like Time magazine, and capture public figures like John Wayne and Alexander Solzhenitsyn. From 1965, he taught at universities including the
University of Idaho and University of California before being offered a visiting professorship at the University of Oregon. In 1967, alongside Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Claes Oldenburg and Edward Hopper, he represented the United States at the Sao Paulo 9 Biennale in Brazil – marking his breakthrough in the international art world. In 1972, despite huge success, he chose to go into self-imposed exile to develop his artistic expression away from the constraints of the material world. Then in 1997, he received a call from Professor David McCarthy at the Smithsonian American Art Museum – thus marking his re-entrance into the art world. In recent years, accolades have included a retrospective exhibition at the San Angelo Museum of Fine Arts in Texas, and a 2007 documentary titled James Gill Full Circle. Notoriously elusive, he resides just outside of his hometown of San Angelo.
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