A Seascape

Literature

David Burliuk was born into a wealthy Ukranian family. He studied art in Moscow, Paris and Munich. He ultimately arrived in NY where he organized exhibitions and formed part of a group in the early 40s and 50s which regularly met to discuss and argue their artistic visions. The group were primarily of Eastern European roots and included Archille Gorky, Mark Rothko and Jackson Pollock, all of whom were good friends. There were group exhibitions including The Ten in 1940 at the ACA Gallery and at that time, Burliuk was considered the most important and also most successful of the group.

Burliuk was unique in that he introduced many different styles of painting into a single work with the intention of creating a diverse but equally balanced look. His style ranged from Cubist to Modern with subjects of Russian scenes to landscape or harbor scenes. He often applied a thick impasto on his surfaces and used a palette knife or only his bold and zestful brush. But he also painted with a thinner and softer palette of pastel tones, again demonstrating his rare diversity of style.

David Burliuk had maried in Russia before leaving in 1922 and has a large extended family now living in the US. In 2009 Russia organized a large exhibition of its artists who emigrated to the US including Burliuk, Rothko, Gorky and Max Weber. Further, the Russian government issued a memorial stamp of the artist in 1982, his centennial year, as one of the greatest Russian artists of all time.