Gino Hollander

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Eugene F. Hollander or Gino Hollander (born August 4, 1924 in New Jersey, U.S.A.) is a self-taught American painter. He began painting around the beginning of modern art in New York City during the abstract expressionist movement.

Biography

Early Life
Gino Hollander was born on August 4, 1924, in New Jersey. His father was in the fur business, A. Hollander and Sons which enabled the family to travel to Europe, a nine month stay in Paris being one of the young Hollander's memories of youth . At age 13, Hollander experienced his first adventure with a 1,000 mile bike trip up the Connecticut River Valley alone. His next life adventure began when he joined the Army.

World War II
He was a member of the United States Army's 10th Mountain Division Ski Troops and is a veteran of World War II.

New York City
In the mid-19th century, he was a successful filmmaker along with his wife Barbara Hollander before quitting to paint in 1960, during the abstract expressionism movement in New York City. He became one of the group that defined this movement and whom all hung out at the famous Cedar Tavern. His medium. acrylic paint, was just emerging at that time and he was among the first to explore its possibilities.

From 1960-1962, he had his studio and the first Hollander Gallery on Bleecker Street, in Greenwich Village, NYC. Although his paintings sold to the likes of Jacqueline Kennedy, Steve McQueen and Norman Rockwell, Hollander wasn't satisfied with his art and in search of fulfillment, he turned to Spain.

Spain
To remove himself from the hype of the New York City art scene, Hollander moved his family to Spain in 1962, often bartering paintings to support his family while he continued honing his painting style, furthering his promising yet unproven career. As Spain was in a modernizing period, Gino and his wife Barbara took their kids on archaeological trips, following the road construction crews which were building new highways throughout Spain, unearthing ancient treasures. They created Museo Hollander, renamed Pizarra Municipal Museum, located in Cortijo de las Yeguas, Spain, to exhibit this collection of Spanish antiques and artifacts that span 20,000 years of history exhibiting along with Gino's paintings. In 1990, after 28 years in Spain, the Hollanders donated their museum to the government of Spain and were nationally awarded in honor of the King's birthdate a Medallion de Plata for greatly contributing to the country's growth in tourism.

Aspen
Currently living in Aspen, Colorado, Hollander continues to paint daily in addition to filming a documentary about his art and his life. He also appeared in the film Mountain Town.

Artistic Style

Hollander paints for himself. He has no wish to engage in a dialogue with the viewer. It is for him to paint for the viewer to view, the two separate faces of any work of art; both allow a work to be. He refuses to title his paintings. He tells no stories. His people are purposely poised on the far edge of nothingness, faces left blank or at best enigmatic. His figures are abstracted and his abstracts disturbingly figurative. He’ll paint through the day and on into the night, each canvas a different mood. From stark black and white to a splash of brilliant colors and on to a subtle moody sepia, then back to a black and white, gentle this time. He is a complex man and his canvasses reinforce this complexity in the very simplicity of their form and content.

The painter paints. He refuses to discuss his work or for that matter, art in general. To him “there’s nothing verbal about a canvas. A painting is simply one way to express a feeling and feelings can only be made less if they are talked to death”. Beginning and end of conversation. Hollander is a difficult man to interview. Like his paintings, he is tricky, hard to pin down. He’ll talk with you for hours and it is only very late in the night that you are aware that he is interviewing you, finding out who you are and how you feel. He’ll discuss any valid subject in the world. Except his paintings. The canvas has no meaning for him once it is finished. It is the push and pull, the emotional context of painting that captures him. From then on it is the province of the viewer alone. There is a dialogue of course, but a wordless one. A statement, a response; a question, an answer. If these exist they are mute. This is a dialogue of the heart or, perhaps, the soul.

Hollander’s reaction to the garishness and violence of life today takes a unique form: his mood is often of softness and gentleness. He is an eternal romantic. Women exist in the world of his paintings. He sees the hopes and promise in the face of an adolescent standing on the threshold of maturity. There is no disillusion nor despair. Nor is their gaiety. There is only wanting and hope and perhaps more than a little questioning. He paints vast faceless groups the wandering figures intertwined in constant movement. Yet each figure is alone, separate, uninvolved, as in essence each of us must be. Even in his most violent seascapes one knows the slender fishing boat will make it safely back to port.

Behind the sun-washed white wall of his country villages one senses a full teeming life, a place for one and all.¹

Hollander Galleries
HG Sullivan St., Greenwich Village, NYC 1961 - 1st painting sold here.

HG, Bleeker St., Greenwich Village, NYC 1962-1967 - paintings sold here provided money for the move to Spain.

HG, 950 Madison Ave., NYC 1967-1972 - across from the Whitney Museum.

HG Torremolinos, Costa del Sol, Spain 1962-1963

HG Hotel Pez Espada, Torremolinos, Costa del Sol, Spain 1963-1973

HG Hotel Don Pepe, Marbella, Spain 1964-1990

HG Atalaya Park, Costa del Sol, Spain 1964-1985

HG Hotel Puente Romano, Marbella, Spain 1965-1985

HG Mount St., London 1966-1976

HG Marbella Club Hotel, Spain 1967-1990

HG Hollander-York, Toronto 1968-1980

HG West Broadway, NYC 1970-1982

HG Hamburg, Germany 1975-1978

HG Museo Hollander, Yeguas, Spain 1982-1990 – archeological museum as well as a charitable organization.

HG Minneapolis, MN, 2006 - current

Notes
1. Barbara Hollander, writer and poet.

Website
www.ginohollander.org

Museums and Institutions
Bristol Museum
Sloane Kettering Hospital
Shell Oil Co., Houston
Hotel St. Regis, NYC
City College of New York
TWA Airlines
Montefiore Hospital, NY
New York Pres. Hosp.
Mt. Sinai Hospital
Cedars of Lebanon
City of Hope
McCann Erickson
Love Field, Dallas
Pennsylvania Hospital
Aspen Valley Hospital
Diplomat Hotel, Israel
Hotel St. Moritz
White Museum
Museo Hollander
National Jewish Medical Center

Private and Estate Collections
Artur Rubenstein
James Michener
John Crosby
Morley Safer
Jacqueline Kennedy
Walter Lowendahl
Vizcondesa de Llanterno
Alan Ladd
Leontyne Price
Herbert Kretzmer
Leo Narducci
Ricky Nelson
Oscar de la Renta
Howard Head
Taki Fukishima
Van Cliburn
Ben Thylan
Vincent Sardi
Faye Emerson
Burt Lancaster
John Mitchell
Betty Pfister
Isaac Stern
Princ. Maria Louisa de Prussia
HRH Sophia of Spain
Count Schoenburg
Condessa de Salamanca
Geoffrey Beene
John Houston
William Pattis
Norman Rockwell
Brian Epstein
Melvin Douglas
Edward G. Robinson
Steve McQueen
Dr. Morris Cohen
Andrew Dickenson
Dr.and Mrs. TV Soong
James Griffin