Contact Information: Studio Visits by Appointment Only US. Route #1 to Thomaston, Maine. Turn onto Wadsworth Street. Drive 6 miles down the Cushing peninsula. At Fale's Grocery Store take the left fork. Drive 2.4 miles to 476 Pleasant Point Road. 476 Pleasant Point Road Cushing Maine 04563 (207) 354~883 Website: Alan Magee Studios E~mail: info@alanmagee.com

Biography:

Alan Magee, born in 1947 in Newtown, Pennsylvania, attended art school in Philadelphia and, in 1969, began working as an editorial and book illustrator in New York. Among his regular clients were Time Magazine, Playboy, Atlantic, New York Magazine, The New York Times, Bantam, Avon, Ballantine and Pocket Books. His illustrations received numerous awards from the Society of Illustrators, Communication Arts Magazine and the Art Director's Clubs of Los Angeles, Chicago and New York.  In the late 1970s, Magee began to concentrate exclusively on his personal paintings and, in 1980, had his first solo exhibition at Staempfli Gallery in NYC.  Since that time, he has had annual one-man shows throughout the United States and Europe. A ten-year retrospective, Alan Magee 1981-1991, traveled to four US museums. Currently a thirty-year retrospective is traveling throughout the US.

A book of Magee's paintings, Stones and Other Works, was published by Harry N. Abrams in 1986 and the book, Alan Magee 1981-1991, was published in 1991 by the Farnsworth Art Museum. A 224-page monograph Alan Magee, Paintings, Sculpture, Graphics was published in 2003 by Forum Gallery. He received The American Book Award in 1982 and has received awards from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and the National Academy of Design. Several half-hour television documentaries have been made about his work including the WCBB production, Alan Magee, Visions of Darkness and Light. Magee has been interviewed on radio for Voice of America, Monito (Christian Science Monitor) Radio in NYC, WHYY in Philadelphia, and Pacifica Radio in San Francisco.

Magee's works can be seen in many public collections including The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, The Portland Museum of Art, the Farnsworth Art Museum, the Arkansas Art Center, the Arizona State University Art Museum and the Columbus (Ohio) Museum of Art. His work is included in the private collections of Mobil Oil, the Atlantic Richfield Co., Lucasfilm, Inc., Cargill Corporation, Continental Grain, the Bank of Japan, the Union Trust Bank, The Janss Collection, and the collections of Billy Wilder, Chermayeff & Geissmar, Johnny Carson, Mike Nichols and Diane Sawyer, Nicholas Cage, Morley Safer, and Richard & Jalane Davidson, among others. Magee is represented by Forum Gallery in New York and Los Angeles.

Exhibitions and Updates

 

Grand Illusions • Dowling Walsh Gallery, July 2 - 31, 2021

The paintings in this exhibition were made in late 2020 and 2021, but my
fascination with armor began long ago. As a child I made detailed drawings of
suits of armor, and that early allure of the metal-clad human form has stayed with
me. Echos of those childhood drawings reappear today in my doodles, in the
articulated limbs of my sculpted figures, and in these new large-scale paintings of
helmets.

I’ve been visiting armor collections for well over forty years. There is a vast
repository of European battle armor, for example, in Graz, Austria, as well as in
Dresden, in Nuremberg, and at the National Museum of Poland in Krakow, the
Germanisches Historisches Museum in Berlin, and at the Metropolitan Museum
of Art in New York.

As I worked on these paintings, I marveled at the seamless fusion of human
artistry with the age-old instinct for organized violence. And that marriage of aweinspiring
craft and military power continues; these helmets are not far removed in
their purpose from B-2 Stealth Bombers and Reaper Drones.

In an issue of Harpers many years ago, Lewis Lapham wrote that to understand
the American reverence for our sophisticated war machines, we need to see
them as our nation’s religious art. The helmets could be seen in the same way—
not only as masterfully-made protections for the head, but as emblems of a
system of beliefs.

Alan Magee
June, 2021

 

Davistown Museum exhibiting artist, friend, and Liberty Tool Co. afficionado Alan Magee is featured in a new film and an exhibition at the Dowling Walsh Gallery in Rockland. A segment was filmed at the Davistown Museum and features Alan discussing his art and their shared passions and interests with curator/Liberty Tool founder Skip Brack. The public is invited to attend the screening of the documentary Alan Magee: art is not a solace at the Strand Theatre on Friday, September 27, 2019, at 5:30 PM, in Rockland, Maine, followed by a Q&A and a reception at the Center for Maine Contemporary Art for the filmmakers and Alan afterward (https://cmcanow.org/event/alan-magee-reception/) The film had its premiere two weeks ago at the Camden International Film Festival.

 

2017

Filmmaker David Wright (http://www.expeditioncamera.com/ )recently visited the museum and Liberty Tool to film a segment of his feature documentary The Dark Illuminates the Light (http://www.expeditioncamera.com/thedarkilluminatesthelight ) about artist Alan Magee, whose work is featured in the museum.

"This film takes the viewer on a breathtaking visual journey—an exploration of the artist’s recurring subjects, locales, and the historical sources which have sustained his passion for five decades. Through his paintings, sculpture, monotypes, music, and short films Magee invites viewers to travel with him through the veiled recesses of human experience—and back into the affirming light of day.
​Through this film, Director David Wright hopes to inspire people in all disciplines, especially the young, to bring their gifts and aptitudes to bear on the multiple crises that threaten our common future. " (from http://www.expeditioncamera.com/thedarkilluminatesthelight)

Skip is one of a number of Alan’s friends filmed in conversation with him for the documentary. They discussed how Alan’s work has been influenced by and connects with Liberty Tool, Skip’s work, and the museum.

Photos from Filming:

	David and his sound-man Ian setting up the sound system before filming.
	David wiring Skip for sound
	David and Ian filming Skip and Alan in conversation
	David filming with his very high-tech equipment
	Ian, David, Skip, and Alan celebrating the completion of the filming
	Skip, Judith, Monika, and Alan after the filming was completed

 

 

2016

 

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2014

The Ghost of Joe McCarthy in Alan Magee's "Party Line"

Screening at the Camden International Film Festival - Alan Magee’s “Party Line” will screen on Saturday, September 27, at 1 p.m. at the Strand Theatre in Rockland and again on Sunday, September 28, at 1 p.m. at the Farnsworth Art Museum.

2012

Alan Magee at Artline Forum Gallery
730 Fifth Avenue at 57th Street, New York
212-355-4545
gallery@forumgallery.com

 

2011

2007

April 28 ~ July 21: Alan Magee: From the Underground River, @ Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockport, ME
July 20th, Lecture: Alan Magee: From the Underground River @ Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockport, ME
August 4th & 5th, Alan Magee Open Studio, Cushing, Maine

2006
Sordoni Art Gallery,  Beyond Recognition: The Art of Alan Magee, Wilkes University, Wilkes-Barre, PA
Goethe Institut New York, Alan Magee: Traurarbeit (The Work of Mourning)
Elan Fine Arts, All Too Human: Alan Magee Monotypes, Rockport, Maine
Forum Gallery, Alan Magee: Time Pieces, New York

Work in the Davistown Museum Permanent Collection

Thingpoem, Inheritance, Helix -  2004
woven cotton
100" x 33" (each)

Work in the Davistown Museum MAG Gallery for Sale

Artifact - 1999 archival inkjet print 26 1/2"  x 32" $800.00	Couplet - 2004 archival inkjet print 17 1/2" x 14 1/4" $250.00	Natural History - 2004 archival inkjet print 24" x 30" $300.00	Verse - 2005 archival inkjet print 16" x 13" $250.00
Ode - 2003 archival inkjet print 30" x 24" $500.00	Diary - 2003 archival inkjet print 16" x 13" $250.00	Catena - 2005 archival inkjet print $500.00	Pact - 2005 archival inkjet print $250.00
	Wrench archival inkjet print $150.00