Sacramento, CA – Artist Irving Norman’s vast, highly detailed paintings communicate his perceptions of modern life and the society in which he lived.  His unsettling visions are at once shocking and unforgettable.  However, Norman lived in relative obscurity as an artist, stemming in part from his political beliefs, which led to 20 years of surveillance by the FBI.  Today, Norman is still little known, yet the dark themes he explored in his art remain as relevant as when they were first composed.  Now, in the year that Norman would have turned 100, his powerful works will be explored at the Crocker Art Museum in Dark Metropolis: Irving Norman’s Social Surrealism, on view through January 7, 2007.

An émigré from Poland who survived World War I as a child, Norman witnessed atrocities as a machine gunner in the Abraham Lincoln Brigade of the Spanish Civil War.  These experiences prompted him to paint with a dark vision both personal and prophetic.  Writing in Art in America (July 2003), Michael Duncan described his work as “jaw-droppingly effective social indictments that would have been endorsed by Orwell and Huxley.  The unrestrained passion and monumental energy of [his] work blows most contemporary political art out of the water.”

Norman’s massive canvases abound with teeming figures, drone-like and mechanical in their repetition, yet stubbornly and hauntingly human.  The combination of jewel-tone colors, transcendent messages and technical virtuosity make his work unique in the history of American art.

This exhibition, curated by Scott A. Shields, Ph.D., Chief Curator at the Crocker Art Museum, consists of approximately 25 large-scale paintings along with 14 examples of the artist’s works on paper, and it is accompanied by a 228-page color catalogue.  After debuting at the Crocker, this exhibit will show at the Pasadena Museum of California Art from January 26 through May 13, 2007 and the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art in Logan, Utah from June 5 through October 13, 2007.

The Crocker Art Museum was founded in 1885 and continues as the leading art institution for the California Capital Region and Central Valley.  The Museum offers a diverse spectrum of special exhibitions, events and programs to augment its collections of Californian, European and Asian artworks.  The Crocker is located at 216 O Street in downtown Sacramento.  Museum hours are 10 a.m. – 5 p.m., Tuesday – Sunday; Thursday until 9 p.m. For more information on exhibits and events visit : www.crockerartmuseum.org