Judith Rothschild (1921-1993), a brilliant colorist with a keen eye for composition, gained success as a young artist in New York in the 1940s. Following her graduation from Wellesley in 1943, Rothschild studied at the Art Students League with Reginald Marsh, at Stanley William Hayter’s Atelier 17, and with Hans Hofmann and Karl Knaths. Recognized as a gifted and precocious abstract painter, in 1945 she became a member of the Jane Street group, which included artists Leland Bell, Nell Blaine, Jane Freilicher, and Larry Rivers. Her first solo exhibition was held at their space, Jane Street Gallery, in December 1945. Firmly rooted in the order of Cubism but painted with the vitality of an emergent talent, Rothschild’s paintings and collages retain a freshness in rhythm with contemporary sensibilities, worthy of reexamination.

She was a member and later president of the American Abstract Artists, a member of the Jane Street Gallery, and an editor of Leonardo magazine. Ms. Rothschild was deeply interested in the careers of fellow artists and sought to create and share opportunities for advancement with them. For instance, she joined with several fellow artists to form the cooperative Long Point Gallery in Provincetown, on Cape Cod. It is in this spirit of cooperation and support that The Judith Rothschild Foundation was created by her will, based on her belief that the life’s work of meritorious artists should be preserved and made accessible to future generations.

As a further reflection of her commitment to arts organizations and to the importance of contributing the insights of a working artist, Rothschild actively served at various times as a trustee of The American Federation of Arts, The MacDowell Colony, The New York Studio School, The Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, and on committees of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Wellesley, Williams, and Bard College art museums.

Judith Rothschild worked in oils and collage and began her relief paintings in the early 1970s; the reliefs combine figurative elements with an abstract sign language, wedding sensual color to austere formal structures. Her work is included in the collections of many museums, such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, the Phillips Collection, The Museum of Modern Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Sammlung Ludwig Museum in Aachen, The Neuberger Museum, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, the Fogg Art Museum, and the Smith and Wellesley College art museums, and a number of museums abroad including The Tate Gallery, Centre Pompidou, and the State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg.

*From the Judith Rothschild Foundation. 

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