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Gerard Tempest: Abstract Spiritualism

A retrospective exhibit from 1947 to 1991

November 2-26, 2006

Opening reception: Thursday, November 2, 2006 from 5:30 until 7:30 p.m.

Gallery Talk at 6 p.m.

The year 2006 marks the 55th anniversary of artist Gerard Tempest’s first association with Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Originally he came in 1951 as an inspired 33-year-old artist, a veteran of World War II, a friend of the renowned surrealist Giorgio de Chirico and a recent graduate of the University of North Carolina. He and his beloved wife Sarah Margaret moved to the Grand Strand and immediately made a name for themselves among the residents.

Born in Italy in 1918, Gerardo Francisco Tempesta was surrounded by the culture of Italian art during his early childhood. His ancestor, Antonio Tempesta (1555-1630), was an etcher and painter during the Baroque era, renowned for his engraved prints of battle and hunting scenes. In 1572, Antonio was commissioned by Pope Gregory VIII to complete the fresco begun by Raphael, located on the third floor of the Vatican. These were only some of the accomplishments of this ancestor-artist to whom Gerard Tempest gives great reverence.

At the age of 11, Gerard Tempest moved with his family to Quincy, Massachusetts. It was there the artist later changed his name from Tempesta to Tempest. During WWII, while serving in the United States Army, Tempest participated in the D-day landing at Normandy. Following the War, he returned to Massachusetts in 1945 and declined a mathematics scholarship at MIT to study art with Max Beckmann and Oskar Kokoschka at the Boston Museum of Art.

The year 1948 proved to be a significant turning point in Tempest’s life when he and his wife moved to Rome, the first of many such moves to Italy’s capital. There he studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti and met his mentor and lifelong friend Giorgio de Chirico. For almost two years, Tempest shared studio space with de Chirico during which time he mastered “some elaborate and carefully executed representations of objects,” as de Chirico described his young friend’s trompe l’oeils and portraits. While in the early 50s Tempest’s art took a more abstract route than that of de Chirico’s, both men fully supported one another’s career directions for many years thereafter.

Impressed with Tempest’s love for painting and his quest to capture the spirit behind a work of art, de Chirico encouraged his young protégé to return to the United States and seek an education in philosophy. Taking that advice, Tempest graduated in 1951 from the University of North Carolina with a degree in philosophy. A trip to Myrtle Beach to be in his best friend’s wedding introduced the young Tempests to the Grand Strand, and they decided to move here. Over the next two years, they built two homes in the area, utilizing a shipwreck found on the beach for one in the Dunes Club section. Tempest also opened the area’s first art gallery, Tempest by the Sea, and painted approximately 50 portraits. In addition, he created the two abstract sculptures of a man and woman that still stand at the entrance to the Rivoli Theatre. While he did not teach formal art lessons, he did take the young Sigmund Abeles under his wing and became a profound influence on that artist’s career.

In 1953 the Tempests returned to Rome where he was reinvigorated with the art and architecture of Italy. Tempest and his family moved to Boston in 1954 in order for him to study the history of architecture at Harvard University. Four years later, utilizing his new knowledge, Tempest moved back to North Carolina where he designed and built the much-admired 35-room, 8,500 square foot, Villa Tempesta in Chapel Hill from 1958-1963. This Italianate villa served as his family home for several years. Today it still stands, housing an antiques establishment, Whitehall at the Villa.

It was during the early 1950s that Tempest first began his fascination with Abstract Spiritualism, a term he coined to describe his “landscapes of the mind’s eye.” A recurring theme begun in 1953 and continuing throughout the 1990s, Abstract Spiritualism is defined by Tempest as a “universal expression for spiritual experience through order, harmony and the like, with an energetic force of light to satisfy all aspirations of essence to life and matter.”

In the early 60s Tempest founded a company that sold his personal hand decorated chests. The furniture was painted with Venetian floral pattern designs (unlike his abstract paintings of the period), and thousands were sold internationally.

Throughout his career, Tempest’s paintings have been part of private and public collections across the world. He has also shown in a number of group and solo exhibitions throughout the United States, in France, Iran and Italy. In 1982 and again in 1990 perhaps his most validating accomplishments came when his contributions to the contemporary art world were acknowledged at the renowned Vatican Museum. Even more importantly, his work was made a part of the Vatican’s permanent art collection.

Coming full circle now, Gerard Tempest, whose entire life has been dedicated to the arts, returns to Myrtle Beach not only for a retrospective exhibition at the Franklin G. Burroughs ~ Simeon B. Chapin Art Museum, but also to reside once more. Though the ensuing time has changed a few things, he continues to believe a person needs to dream, which can be difficult in a practical world, and his art reminds one to embrace the spiritual side of our human existence. In summary the artist states, “Total light equals the absence of all physicality; it is directing us to the spirit, and it is total abstraction. The achievement of total light is what we are all looking for.”

29th Annual South Carolina Watercolor Society Exhibition

November 2-26, 2006

Opening reception: Thursday, November 2, 2006 from 5:30 until 7:30 p.m.

A perennial favorite, the South Carolina Watercolor Society's annual juried exhibition comes to us through the auspices of the South Carolina State Museum's Traveling Exhibits Program. The 52 paintings in the exhibit were chosen from 172 entries, and one-third of the works are by artists new to the competition. 

Juror for the event was Martha Mayberry, who serves as registrar and associate curator of prints and drawings at the Mint Museum of Art in Charlotte, NC.  In her juror's statement, Mayberry noted that watercolor has long been a favorite medium for landscape and portraiture, but that new technology in pigments, binders, and the use of other materials in mixed-media compositions have expanded the possiblities for artistic expression by its practitioners.

In addition to viewing the works, art lovers can have the opportunity of taking some of the pieces home.  A large number of the paintings will be available for sale, and we will also have Watercolor Society art posters for sale in the Museum Shop.