Pas de Deux #4 (Vicki Hudspith & Wally Turverville)
Details
Edition
/150
Medium
Serigraph
Signature
Pencil Signed
Unframed Dimensions
36 x 19.75 in
91.44 x 50.16 cm
Framed Dimensions:
42.75 x 27 in
108.59 x 68.58 cm
Year
1994
MORE FROM THIS ARTIST
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Alex Katz (b. 1927, Brooklyn, New York) stands among the most influential figures in postwar and contemporary American art. Celebrated for his bold, minimalist portraits and sweeping landscapes, Katz created a visual language defined by crisp contours, flat expanses of color, and striking compositional clarity. His clean, distilled and direct aesthetic has become synonymous with a distinctly modern American sensibility.
Katz studied at The Cooper Union and later at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, where plein-air painting deeply shaped his approach to light, immediacy, and form. Bridging realism and abstraction, Katz developed a signature style that foregrounds presence over narrative. His portraits, particularly those depicting close friends, cultural figures, and above all his wife and lifelong muse, Ada, achieve an elegant balance between emotional restraint and intimacy.
Katz’s portraits of Ada were created consistently for more than five decades and remain among the most iconic bodies of work in contemporary art. Rendered with geometric clarity and minimal detail, Ada appears against flat, monochrome backdrops, her poised expressions capturing the quiet depths of partnership, familiarity, and devotion. These works are central to Katz’s contribution to the movement often described as “New Realism,” where form, atmosphere, and elegance take precedence over symbolism or psychological complexity.
Katz’s first solo exhibition took place in 1954 at Roko Gallery in New York. Throughout the 1960s he taught at institutions such as Pratt Institute, the School of Visual Arts, and the New York Studio School, while also designing stage sets and costumes for the Paul Taylor Dance Company, an early indication of his sensitivity to movement and large-scale visual rhythm. His work received major institutional recognition with exhibitions at the Whitney Museum of American Art, including a 1974 exhibition dedicated to his prints and a landmark retrospective in 1986.
Since the 1950s, Katz has spent his summers in Lincolnville, Maine, cultivating a deep relationship with Colby College. In 1996, the Colby College Museum of Art inaugurated a dedicated wing housing more than 400 of Katz’s works (one of the largest museum holdings of a living artist). Katz’s large-scale public artworks further demonstrate his impact, from a 1977 Times Square billboard to a monumental cutout sculpture in Chicago and 19 large works installed throughout the NYC Subway in 2019.
Today, Alex Katz’s paintings, prints, and sculptures are represented in the world’s most important collections, including the Museum of Modern Art (New York), the Whitney Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Tate Modern (London), and the Centre Pompidou (Paris). Recent retrospectives at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (2022) and the Museum of Modern Art (2024) reaffirm his central role in shaping the trajectory of modern and contemporary painting. His market remains exceptionally strong, with his auction record set by Blue Umbrella I at $4.1 million.
Explore Alex Katz at DTR Modern Galleries
DTR Modern Galleries proudly presents works by Alex Katz, offering collectors access to one of the most iconic American painters of the last century. Katz’s instantly recognizable portraits and landscapes are available across our contemporary gallery locations in New York City, Boston, Palm Beach, and Washington, D.C.
