In the 1940s a group of young artists known as the Fort Worth Circle would thrust Texas into the American avant-garde. This rebellious coterie of Modernists, eclectic in style and without a singular artistic ethos, were a close-knit group of friends and classmates who shared a sensibility for the experimental.

 

Just as Fort Worth itself symbolized a geographic frontier, so too did the Fort Worth Circle come to demarcate an aesthetic frontier.

 

Infused with elements of Biomorphic Abstraction, Cubism, and Surrealism, the work of these men and women delved into a psychologically complex internal world. Therein, ethereal figures populate dream worlds rife with symbolism. Abstracted metaphors of shape, line, and color cross over from the World of Forms into the here-and-now.

 

Away from the Earth: The Fort Worth Circle of Artists showcases the work of these visionary Texan artists, featuring select paintings and works on paper from the collections of the Amon Carter Museum of American Art and the Dallas Museum of Art.

 

Pictured: Bror Utter (1913–1993)

Metamorphosis III (Assembly of Birds)

1953

Oil on artist's board

20 x 26 in.

Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Fort Worth, Texas

1996.6

© 2006 Nilla Jane Bel