Arnold Friedman

Untitled (Red Wheelbarrow), New York Harbor Scene

ca. 1940

Modernist painter Arnold Friedman, was born in New York City. He did not study art until 1905, with Robert Henri at the Art Students League in New York City. He supported himself by working in the post-office. Eleven paintings by Arnold Friedman were shown in New York City in 2002 at the Berry-Hill Galleries in the exhibition, High Notes of American Modernism: Selections from the Tommy and Gill LiPuma Collection. Friedman's paintings appeared in two exhibitions in New York City in 2003, a one-man show at the Barbara Mathes Gallery, and a survey, American Art: 1750 to the Present, at the Richard York Gallery. A comprehensive 1986 exhibition of approximately one hundred eleven paintings and some watercolors and drawings was held at the Salander-O-Reilly Galleries in New York City. The show, Arnold Friedman (1874-1946): An Exhibition: Paintings, Drawings and Watercolors, gave rise to an extensive catalogue with an essay by critic Hilton Kramer. Arnold Friedman participated, from February 14-16, 1936, in the First Congress of American Artists against War and Fascism, in New York City. An extant publication records the essays of painters Stuart Davis and Peter Blume, photographer Margaret Bourke-White, sculptor Paul Manship and critic Lewis Mumford, among others, as well as the artists who attended, including painters Max Weber, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Jose Clemente Orozco, Harry Sternberg, Arnold Blanch and John Groth.