Anderson Shea Art Appraisals
Artists
 
Edward Biberman (1904-1986)
American

Edward Biberman was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1904. He was trained at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and then traveled to Paris in order to gain further artistic training. Upon returning to New York City 1929 he was asked to show his work at the Museum of Modern Art in one of the most important exhibitions of his career. The show was titled "Forty-six Under Thirty-five”. Biberman was said to have met the famed Mexican Muralist, Diego Rivera, while in New York.

In 1936 Biberman settled in Los Angeles. Preceding his way West, the artist became intrigued by the allure of the Southwest desert. In the early 1930s he acquainted himself with Georgia O’Keeffe and John Marin. Like O’Keeffe, Biberman painters modified realist painting by applying a modernist aesthetic. 

Biberman became an essential part of the mid-century Los Angeles art scene. He painted murals in the Venice Beach Post Office and well as the Los Angeles Federal Building and Post Office. He often painted the figure as a way of addressing issues of race, immigration, labor, and ensuing social inequality in Los Angeles. Biberman taught at Art Center College in Los Angeles from 1930 to 1950. His paintings are held by the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Palm Springs Desert Museum, among others.

Sources:
Edan Hughes, Artists in California, 1786-1940; Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, 2002
“Edward Biberman,” Askart.com

 

  Return to Artists list »