May 14 - June 27, 2026, Tuesday - Saturday, 10:00am - 5:30pm; Opening reception Thursday, May 14, 6-8pm
Modernism is pleased to present its first exhibition of San Francisco painter Ward Schumaker. The survey brings together paintings from the past twenty years that demonstrate Schumaker's sustained commitment to iterative explorations in mark making and the integration of gestural abstraction with language and numbers. The exhibition also includes a selection of original books hand-painted by the artist, providing further insight into Schumaker's expansive practice.
Ward Schumaker (b. 1943, Omaha, NE) is a San Francisco-based artist and acclaimed illustrator whose practice encompasses mixed-media painting, works on paper, unique books and ceramics. His compositions frequently incorporate famous passages of literature from sources such as Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" or the writings of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. In others, the artist pulls cryptic phrases from the ether. Both the recognizable and ambiguous language functions as a visual mantra, engaging questions of communication, memory and meditation.
Using hand-cut stencils, Schumaker creates letters that oscillate between clarity and disintegration. In many cases, language breaks down entirely: letters fragment into abstract forms or dissolve into fields of gestural marks. A significant portion of the work dispenses with text altogether, emphasizing rhythm and movement. Across these variations, Schumaker treats language not only as content to be communicated, but as material to be repeated and transformed.
Schumaker's approach to technique, appropriation and color, are inspired by masters such as Franz Kline, Robert Rauschenberg and Piet Mondrian, however, music has been a guiding influence throughout Schumaker's work, often more so than painting itself. His approach to repetition, interval and variation parallels the logic of musical structure, with a particular affinity for Russian composers and minimalist traditions.
THE PUBLIC IS INVITED TO AN OPENING RECEPTION ON THURSDAY, MAY 14, FROM 6-8PM
Free
Presented by MODERNISM INC..