Park, David, 1911-1960

Painter, teacher; California.

Park taught at the California School of Fine Arts from 1943-1952. Worked in Bay Area figurative painting style.

From the description of David Park papers, 1917-1973. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 86118545

Biography

Born in Boston, Mass., David Park studied at The Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles in 1928. Upon moving to the San Francisco Bay area, Park first taught at the California School of Fine Arts, 1944-52, and then at the University of California at Berkeley from 1955-60. A figure painter in the 1930s and `40s, Park began experimenting with Abstract Expressionism in the 1950s, greatly influenced by the works of Clifford Still and Mark Rothko. Park then reconsidered his earlier interest in the human form, now through an Expressionist eye, and became one of the foremost proponents of the New Figurative movement in the Bay Area. He died of cancer in 1960.

From the guide to the David Park correspondence with Howard and Dorothy Baker, 1937-1952, (Stanford University. Libraries. Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives.)