Influential L.A. Painter Ed Moses B.A. '55, M.F.A. '58 dies at 91
We are saddened to announce the passing of Ed Moses, "Cool School" painter, alumnus, and instructor in the UCLA Department of Art from 1968–72 and 1975–76. Moses will be remembered as one of the city's most productive and experimental artists of the last half-century and will be dearly missed by the UCLA Arts community.
"When he was 90 years old, preparing for a 2016 exhibition of new work, Ed Moses zipped across the courtyard of his Los Angeles art studio in a paint-spattered wheelchair and stained Birkenstocks. The artist, who was still working every day, jerked his chair to a stop at a row of enormous canvases, the fresh paint drying in the sun.
"You caught me on a good day!" he bellowed, noting some vibrantly colored abstract works. "These are all self-portraits. These paintings have history, action — scars and blemishes, scratches and imperfections. These are me."
All that intensity, history and action came to a close Wednesday evening when Moses died at his home in the Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles, adjacent to his art studio. He died peacefully at 91 of natural causes, surrounded by family, his son Andy Moses said Thursday.
Moses will be remembered as an L.A. art world fixture, one of the city's most productive and experimental artists of the last half-century. He had a restless romance with abstract painting that sparked a perpetually evolving body of work, leading him to dub himself “The Mutator.” Moses formed the “Cool School” of artists — who included Ed Ruscha, Robert Irwin, Larry Bell, Edward Kienholz, John Altoon, Ken Price and Billy Al Bengston — at L.A.'s influential Ferus Gallery in the 1950s and '60s. Their raucous partying and creative camaraderie not only fused a nascent local scene but made the art world beyond take notice...
A self-described rebellious youth, Moses enrolled at Long Beach Polytechnic High School but dropped out after three semesters. He joined the U.S. Navy in 1944 and served two years as a surgical technician. His aptitude for treating war injuries led him to consider a medical career. When he returned to civilian life, he enrolled at Long Beach City College as a premed student. But an art class with painter Pedro Miller sent him off in a different direction.
Moses transferred to UCLA in 1949 and drifted in and out of the university for nearly a decade, receiving a master of fine arts degree in 1958. Though frequently at odds with his instructors, he made important contacts with Craig Kauffman and other young artists who would be affiliated with the Ferus Gallery, a hub of avant-garde activity on La Cienega Boulevard...
Moses taught art at UCLA from 1968 to 1972 and from 1975 to 1976. He also held temporary teaching positions at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine and at Cal State Bakersfield and Cal State Long Beach. He won a National Endowment for the Arts grant in 1976 and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1984.
Beginning at the 1949 California State Fair in Sacramento, where the youthful Moses won second prize for his painting, he compiled a resume of hundreds of exhibitions throughout his long career...
At his side at the time of his death were Moses’ wife, Avilda Peters; Cedd and Pamela Moses and their two children; and Andy and his wife, Kelly Berg."— Deborah Vankin and Suzanne Muchnic, Jan. 18, 2018
This post is an excerpt, read the full article at the Los Angeles Times website.
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