Ellen Berkenblit (born 1958, Paterson, NJ) is a New York painter best known for her sensual and brightly colored paintings. She received her B.F.A from The Cooper Union in 1980.
Berkenblit's practice hovers between representation and abstraction, often presenting the female figure experiencing a realm of imaginative explosion and escape. Through her unpredictable application of paint, she captures a playful and sinister balance of eroticism and comedy. The female subject is typically depicted in profile, with only minor modifications to her clothing and appearance from piece to piece. The paintings’ spirit is bold, boisterous and forceful, sometimes mysterious, always deeply emotional. The interplay between figurative elements, the intense atmosphere created by color contrast and tonal palette, as well as the compositional devices create figurative paintings of great fluidity and openness without being narrowed by narrative.
Berkenblit has been exhibiting with solo shows since 1984 and her work features in public collections such as The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Farnsworth Art Museum; Rockland; Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and Cincinnati Art Museum. Berkenblit currently lives and works in New York and is represented by Anton Kern Gallery.
