Jan Müller and Bob Thompson: Outside of Time
Virtual

January 28 - March 19, 2022

Exhibition Catalog

"[Thompson] exists outside of time. He brings to his work a profound understanding and relentless curiosity about what it takes to put a composition together. I think that is the reason that so many artists return to the work, live with the works, and want to continue to turn the work over in their minds.”
Diane Tuite

We are pleased to exhibit Jan Müller and Bob Thompson: Outside of Time. Although Jan Müller died several months before Bob Thompson arrived in Provincetown in the summer of 1958, his influence on Thompson's work was profound.

In Provincetown, Thompson transformed his work, developing what would become his signature figurative style while looking to Müller's work for guidance. Müller's wife, Dody Müller, told him: "Don't ever look for your solutions from contemporaries—look at Old Masters."

Our exhibition includes a figurative Thompson painting and an earlier abstract painting, demonstrating the crucial shift in his work that occurred after his summer in Provincetown. It is fascinating to see these works in conversation with Jan Müller's Encounter as Province, 1954. Thompson synthesized the influence of Müller, Old Master compositions, and contemporary social movements to create a brief but remarkable body of work that continues to influence artists today.