Image assets for this folder have not been fully processed.
We apologize for any inconvenience.
John Gruen (1926-2016) was an art critic and photographer who lived and worked in New York. Jane Wilson (1924-2015) was a landscape and expressionism painter who primarily lived and worked in New York. Gruen and Wilson married in 1948.
John Gruen was born in France and moved with his family to New York City at the outbreak of World War II. Gruen completed his studies in art history at the University of Iowa. Initially, Gruen became a music composer and contributed music reviews for the New York Herald Tribune. Gruen became the chief art critic for the New York Times, and he wrote pieces for other outlets such as ART News and Architectural Digest. Gruen was also a photographer, taking photographs of friends and colleagues such as Willem de Kooning and Larry Rivers. He featured his images in various exhibitions as well as written works.
Jane Wilson was born and raised in Seymour, Iowa. Wilson studied and, for a short time, taught at the University of Iowa before moving to New York in 1949 with her husband, John Gruen. In New York, Wilson became associated with the New York School, an informal group of artists, musicians, artists, and writers. Wilson served on the board for organizations such as the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the National Academy of Design. Wilson exhibited her landscape paintings around the country at museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.