Домбровский, Иван Грацианович

Painter, art theoretician

Born Kiev, 27 December 1886

Died London, 27 June 1961

John Graham, born Ivan Dombrovsky, studied law in St. Petersburg and served in the army during the first world war. After the revolution het fled to his mother's native Poland. In 1920 he emigrated to the USA. In 1927 he became a US citizen and took the name John Graham. In 1925 he joined the Baltimore group The Modernists and serves as their secretary and organized exhibitions. He organized Jackson Pollok's first exhibition. He is considered a mentor figure for the Abstract Expressionist American painters. He was the author of System and Dialectics of Art, an influential text during the 1940s, on modern art.

1928-29

1966

1971

1985

1987