John Atlas has been making art in Houston, both painting and sculpture, for over four decades. This exhibition is the most comprehensive show of his art assembled thus far and spans his entire career from his first serious work completed in 1969, to several large canvases completed in the weeks leading up to the installation of this show. 

The exhibition consists of over eighty paintings on canvas and paper, and a number of sculptures including wooden constructions made as studies for objects that appear in the paintings. Atlas’ mastery of color and composition, and his ability to move from hallucinatory figuration to more surrealistic and non-objective work is evident throughout the exhibition.

John Atlas was born in 1952 in Boston Mass. and moved to Houston with his family at age three. His father, a doctor, worked in bio-medical research for the National Institute of Health in Boston, and worked at the local V.A. hospital upon arrival in Houston. He later set up his private practice in Pasadena Tx. and commuted there from Houston. Largely a self taught artist, Atlas dropped out of school at age sixteen to pursue painting and drawing full time. Over the years his work has been shown here in Houston at Sally Sprout Gallery, Graham Gallery, Max Hutchinson Gallery, as well as The Museum of Fine Arts, Blaffer Gallery at the University of Houston, and Sewall Art Gallery, Rice University. He has shown internationally in the exhibitions “New Art from a New City: Houston” in Salsburger Kunstverein, Austria and “Art from Houston in Norway: 1982” Stavanger, Norway.

   

 

 

 

 

John Atlas: A Survey of Work, 1969-2014 will be on view through February 2015. 

 

The Art Car Museum is located at 140 Heights Blvd. and is open Wednesday-Sunday, 11am to 6pm. Admission is always free. Please call to schedule tour groups.