Vivian Springford

Vivian Springford (1913-2003) was an American abstract painter whose sophisticated stain paintings have gained substantial recognition in recent decades, restoring her rightful place within the story of American postwar abstraction. Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Springford was educated at the Spence School in New York City and then at the Art Students League. Coming from a prominent family, her father was the former president and chairman of Sevel, Inc., an early maker of refrigerators. She was pictured in the New York Times "Debutantes of the Winter Season in New York" in 1932.

Originally a portrait artist, Springford illustrated Albert Carr's 1938 book Juggernaut with portraits of twenty political dictators from the Napoleonic era to the early twentieth century. She was championed in the late 1950s by Howard Devree, the New York Times art critic, and Harold Rosenberg helped Springford secure her first show at the Great Jones Gallery in 1960. The show generated considerable excitement and was filmed for the movie Bowl of Cherries, now in the film library of the Museum of Modern Art. Prominent collectors including Leon Mnuchin purchased paintings from the exhibition.

Springford shared studio space with the Chinese-American artist Walasse Ting for ten years and helped him with translations of his poetry. Through Ting she developed close contacts with artists including Pierre Alechinsky, Sam Francis, and Karel Appel. Springford wrote of her own work: "My painting is my own small plot of energy, in terms of color and movement, in the universal whole."

Springford also had a solo show at Preston Gallery in New York in 1963, but she became a reclusive artist after that, showing only in occasional group exhibitions at the request of fellow artists and refusing to sell or promote her own paintings. She worked in her New York studio through the mid-1980s, when macular degeneration rendered her blind. Having no immediate family, she was unable to leave her small midtown apartment.

In 1998, a volunteer from United Neighbors of the East Side, which works with New York City's elderly shut-ins, learned about a storage room in Chelsea that held Springford's life's work. Together they visited the room and found more than forty years of paintings and drawings covered in plastic and decades of dust. The volunteer brought samples to the dealer Gary Snyder, known for his revisionist exhibitions of historically overlooked artists. Snyder immediately recognized their importance and began the process of cleaning, restoring, and exhibiting her work. His first exhibition of Springford's paintings in 1998 was nearly sold out before its opening. When Springford died in 2003, Snyder presented a well-received memorial show, and her reputation has continued to grow as scholars restore her place within the history of American abstract painting.