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\u201cSeems like Gertrude was kind of trouble,\u201d said a teenaged girl to her friend as they sat gazing at a series of paintings at the Carnegie Museum of Art\u2019s Gertrude Abercrombie retrospective \u201cThe Whole World Is a Mystery.\u201d The show, on view through June 1st (before traveling on to the Colby College Museum of Art this July), focuses on 85 paintings and the late American Surrealist\u2019s unconventional life\u2014her vibrant Chicago salons of the 1940s and \u201950s; her numerous lovers and queer community; her disinterest in motherhood; and her four prolific decades of painting, in her words, \u201csimple things that are a little strange.\u201d<\/p>\n
The teen stood up and approached the 8-by-10-inch painting Untitled (Lady with Cat)<\/em> (1961), which shows a slender, blindfoldgertrudeed woman in a pink gown. The twist is that her dress and long black hair are pierced to the wall behind her with giant pins, preventing her from gliding towards a blue door and a small black cat. \u201cSo dope,\u201d the girl said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Shell and Drape<\/i>, 1952. Courtesy of Karma Gallery and the Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
Clearly, Abercrombie\u2019s enduring appeal transcends generations. Across her work from the late 1930s to the early \u201970s, Abercrombie masterfully distilled emotion into deceptively simple imagery\u2014from forlorn ladies and mystical figures to crescent moons, doors, cats, seashells, and pink carnations. Rather than merely a visual language to be decoded, the paintings are instinctual responses to her own experiences as well as more universal 20th-century strife\u2014the Great Depression, post\u2013World War II anxieties. Ultimately, Abercrombie\u2019s steadfast commitment to her own enigmatic vision has catapulted her work across time, driving fresh interest nearly five decades since her death.<\/p>\n
Abercrombie\u2019s life in Chicago <\/h2>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Tree, Table and Cat<\/i>, 1937. Private Collection, Illinois. Photo by Michael Tropea. Courtesy of the Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie with There on the Table<\/i> (1935), Gertrude Abercrombie paper, circa 1880-1986, bulk 1935\u20131977, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
Born in 1909 in Austin, Texas, Abercrombie spent most of her life in Chicago. Her career as an artist took root in the 1930s, when she joined the Works Progress Administration (WPA) Federal Art Project. The WPA provided financial support to Abercrombie\u2014along with a host of major American artists such as Jackson Pollock and Thomas Hart Benton\u2014during the Great Depression and allowed her to refine her distinct visual language. \u201cThat gave me a big start and a boost,\u201d she later recalled in an interview with writer and historian Studs Terkel, published in the retrospective catalogue. \u201cGod bless Franklin Delano Roosevelt.\u201d <\/p>\n
So began her timeless practice that draws the viewer into an enigmatic world that feels deeply personal, somewhat familiar, and undeniably intriguing. \u201cShe was not playing for the galleries; she was not gaming art history\u2014she was just doing exactly what she knew how to do,\u201d said Eric Crosby, director of the Carnegie Museum of Art and co-curator of the Abercrombie retrospective, alongside Sarah Humphreville, curator of American art at the Colby College Museum of Art.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Where or When (Things Past)<\/i>, 1948. Collection of the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Wisconsin. Gift of the Gertrude Abercrombie Trust. Photo by Paige Holzbauer. Courtesy of the Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
These surreal, elegant compositions often portray desolate landscapes and spare interiors populated by people, animals, or small objects. The lone, solemn woman with black hair who appears often bears a likeness to the artist herself. And in works where humans are absent, creatures and objects become compelling actors, weaving spellbinding mysteries of their own, often set within ornate frames the artist collected.<\/p>\n
By the 1940s and 1950s, Abercrombie had become a cultural force in Chicago, hosting lively salons at her Hyde Park home. These gatherings brought together artists, writers, and jazz musicians, including trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and saxophonist Charlie Parker.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was creating space for others to be creative and had such close relationships with so many artists and poets,\u201d said Crosby. \u201cShe created space for Black jazz musicians\u2014she played the piano and had jam sessions at her house. She had many friends and lovers within a queer community of painters and poets. There\u2019s a space of creativity that she created and shared with other people that feels really contemporary.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Abercrombie\u2019s Surrealism and symbols<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Strange Shadows (Shadow and Substance)<\/i>, 1950. Private Collection, Illinois. Photo by Michael Tropea. Courtesy of the Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
That contemporary nature is palpable in the current retrospective\u2014the most comprehensive museum presentation of Abercrombie\u2019s work to date\u2014co-organized by the Carnegie Museum of Art and the Colby College Museum of Art. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe Whole World Is a Mystery\u201d traces Abercrombie\u2019s career chronologically, from \u201cday to night,\u201d as Crosby described it. \u201cYou feel a sense of fullness in the work at the beginning, and then it slowly diminishes. The works become smaller, the focus of her vision much more acute.\u201d Early works show landscapes dotted with trees and cloudy skies or sweeping Surrealist works like Strange Shadows (Shadow and Substance)<\/em> (1950), in which a woman, an owl, a blue cup on a pedestal, and a clock on what appears to be a stage, cast shadows that playfully riff on reality. Over time, those landscapes grow darker, skies turn from pale blue to navy and black, and waning crescent moons become the protagonists. <\/p>\nThough often described as Surrealism, Abercrombie\u2019s work was distinct from her peers. \u201cThis isn\u2019t the abstract, symbolic space of a [Salvador] Dal\u00ed painting,\u201d Crosby said, nodding to The Stroll<\/em> (1943), in which our protagonist walks along a path with a cat surrounded by fields of grass. \u201cThis is literally a Midwestern landscape that she\u2019s walked through,\u201d Crosby said. Indeed, while the strange rooms and landscapes are at times filled with the fantastical, they reference everyday realities.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Doors with Cat and Shell<\/i>, 1957. Private Collection, Courtesy of Waqas Wajahat, New York. Photo Courtesy of Phillips. Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
\u201cThese are Midwestern buildings that she\u2019s been in,\u201d Crosby continued. \u201cI think it\u2019s always grounded in the real, grounded in where she came from. These are interior spaces that she lived in. You can imagine these are moons that she\u2019s seen.\u201d<\/p>\n
The second half of the show prominently features two of Abercrombie\u2019s most compelling motifs: doors and seashells. The doors reflect both real and imagined thresholds\u2014rooted in the physical landscape of Chicago\u2019s South Side, where they once served as makeshift barriers amid demolition and gentrification. Meanwhile, her meticulously rendered seashells evoke both tangible objects and abstract portals, their spirals drawing the viewer deeper into the picture plane.<\/p>\n
These \u201csymbols\u201d were not necessarily embedded with specific meaning; rather, they reflected the artist\u2019s world and what she felt compelled to paint. One can tell from the paintings alone, for example, that Abercrombie was most definitely a cat person.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Abercrombie\u2019s rediscovery and resurgence<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Split Personality<\/i>, 1954. Collection of DePaul Art Museum, Art Acquisition Endowment Fund, 2010.21. Photo courtesy of DePaul Art Museum. Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
Despite being well-regarded within Chicago\u2019s art circles and having exhibitions during her lifetime, Abercrombie never reached a level of renown that would ensure her longevity. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe story of American art that we have been told for decades centers on New York and California, to the detriment of incredible artists from the middle of the country,\u201d noted Brendan Dugan, owner of Karma, the gallery that shows the artist\u2019s work. \u201cAbercrombie was unfairly dismissed as \u2018regional\u2019 and overlooked by the mainstream art world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Geography wasn\u2019t the only factor. As a woman artist working in the mid\u201320th century, she faced the same structural barriers that sidelined many of her female contemporaries. And while her work defied easy categorization, her unusual persona\u2014her costumey clothes, raucous social life, proclivity for mysticism\u2014led many to disregard her artistic achievements. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Moored to the Moon<\/i>, 1963. Private Collection, New York. Photo courtesy of 601Artspace. Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
\u201cShe was often written off as merely an eccentric when she was, in fact, an amazingly subtle and inventive painter,\u201d Dugan added.<\/p>\n
By the late 1960s, Abercrombie\u2019s health had deteriorated due to ongoing medical issues and financial hardship. She became less active in the art world, and her reputation faded following her death in 1977. <\/p>\n
Yet that\u2019s been changing in recent years. One turning point came in 2018, when Karma mounted a lauded New York exhibition of Abercrombie\u2019s work. Roberta Smith, writing for the New York Times<\/em>, remarked that the show gave Abercrombie \u201ca new visibility that should be coaxed into an even greater fullness.\u201d Another milestone was the news of the retrospective, which was originally a smaller show that Crosby had planned for the Carnegie Museum, intended to take place prior to the pandemic. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, A Picture in a Picture in a Picture<\/i>, 1955. Private Collection, Los Angeles. Photo courtesy of Sullivan Goss Gallery. Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
\u201cOne of the realities of the world is that people often start paying attention when certain prices start being achieved or certain auction estimates are overachieved,\u201d said Humphreville, co-curator of the retrospective. <\/p>\n
Such is the case with Abercrombie, whose top 10 auction results were all set since May 2021. Many of those records were set by Hindman Auction house, which held a sale of 21 works by Abercrombie from the private collection of Laura and Gary Maurer. The sale shattered expectations, resetting Abercrombie\u2019s auction record. <\/p>\n
\u201c2022 was the year of Abercrombie at Hindman and beyond,\u201d said Zachary Wirsum, the Hindman specialist who organized the sale and is an expert on her market. \u201cThat year, The Dinosaurs<\/em> (1964) sold for $387,500, followed by Untitled (Woman with Tethered Horse and Moon)<\/em> (1947), which hit $437,500.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Gertrude Abercrombie, Four Shells<\/i>, 1952. Courtesy of Ortuzar Projects, New York. Photo courtesy of Ortuzar Projects. Estate of Gertrude Abercrombie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n
Since then, her auction record has been broken multiple times, with the latest benchmark set at Bonhams this past November for one of her larger canvases, Silo at Aledo<\/em> (1953), which sold for $864,100, more than eight times its low estimate. The demand for Abercrombie\u2019s work has even led to instances of forgery, a sign of just how sought-after the work has become.<\/p>\n\u201cI think the market attention has certainly led to a lot of accelerated interest in her,\u201d Humphreville added, \u201cbut I think that\u2019s also all the more reason why it was necessary to do a museum exhibition and really give devoted, serious scholarship to her.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n