“Martha Diamond’s paintings are based on vision, nuance, gesture, light, reflection, and atmosphere. The work is elegant, hip, compelling and thoroughly modern. This is serious painting, uncompromised, deep, and infinitely rewarding.”
—Chuck Close, American Academy of Arts and Letters, 2001
Installation view, William D. Adams Gallery, Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, 2023. From left: Martha Diamond, Palisades (1982); Martin Puryear, Up and Over (2014). Photo: Luc Demers
Honors and Awards
2018 National Academician, National Academy of Design
2017 Anonymous Was a Woman Award
2015 Individual Support Grant, Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation
2013 Art Purchase Program, American Academy of Arts and Letters
2001 Arts and Letters Award for Art, American Academy of Arts and Letters
Art Purchase Program, American Academy of Arts and Letters
1993 Individual Support Grant, Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation
1985 Fellow in Painting, New York Foundation for the Arts
1983 Painting Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts
1980 Artists Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts
Academic Positions
2001-2002 Visiting lecturer, Department of Visual and Environmental Studies, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.
1996, 1998 Visiting artist, Yale Norfolk School of Art, Norfolk, Conn.
1995-1996 Visiting lecturer, Department of Visual and Environmental Studies, Harvard University
1984-1995 Guest artist, Cooper Union School of Art, New York
1983, 1995 Visiting artist, Graduate Painting Department, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
1982-2018 Board of Governors, Skowhegan School, Madison, Maine
1979-1980 Artist-in-residence, Learning Through Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York
1977, 1983 Resident faculty, Skowhegan School
Publications
2025 Painting Energy: The Alex Katz Foundation Collection at the Portland Museum of Art. Shalini Le Gall, ed. Portland, Maine: Portland Museum of Art
Anonymous Was a Woman: The First 25 Years. Foreword by museum director Lynn Gumpert. New York: Grey Art Museum / Hirmer Verlag
2024 Martha Diamond: Deep Time. New York: DelMonico Books | The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum / Colby College Museum of Art
2023 Painting in New York, 1971-83. Essays by Hilton Als, Elizabeth Hess, Lucy Lippard and Ivy Shapiro. New York: Karma Books
2021 On the Bowery. New York: Zürcher Gallery
2020 Collaboration in Print: Stewart & Stewart Fine Art Print Selections 1980–2020. Bloomfield Hills, Mich.: Stewart & Stewart
2017 Visionary Painting. Waterville, Maine: Colby College Museum of Art
SITE/SIGHT. Essay by Carter Ratcliff. Saugerties, N.Y.: Cross Contemporary Art
2016 Martha Diamond: Recent Paintings. Appreciation by Alex Katz, poem by John Godfrey. New York: Alexandre Gallery
2015 Come Together: Surviving Sandy, Year 1. Jack Flam, ed. Milan: Skira / Dedalus Foundation
Bowery Artist Tribute, Vol. 4. New York: New Museum
2010 That Is Then. This Is Now. Essays by Peter Plagens, Martha Schwendener and Emily Warner. New York: CUE Art Foundation
Changing Soil: Contemporary Landscape Painting (in English and Japanese). Nagoya, Japan: Nagoya/Boston Museum of Fine Arts
2009 “About Martha Diamond” in The Importance of Being Iceland: Travel Essays in Art, by Eileen Myles. South Pasadena, Cal.: Semiotext(e)
2005 Collaboration in Print: Stewart & Stewart Screenprints 25th Anniversary. Detroit: Detroit Institute of Arts
2004 The Anxious Image. New York: The Painting Center
2002 Series. Essay by Ilka Scobie. Amherst, Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press
2001 VES Faculty 01/02. Cambridge, Mass.: Department of Visual and Environmental Studies | Harvard University
1994 New York, New York — Recent Cityscapes: Paintings by Martha Diamond, Jane Dickson, Yvonne Jacquette, David Kapp. Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art
1990 Martha Diamond: An Exhibition of Paintings. Poem and essay by Eileen Myles. New York: Robert Miller Gallery
Intaglio Printing in the 1980s. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press
1989 1989 Biennial Exhibition. Foreword by Tom Armstrong. New York: Whitney Museum of American Art / W.W. Norton
The 1980s: Prints from the Collection of Joshua P. Smith. Ruth E. Fine, ed.; foreword by J. Carter Brown. Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art
1988 Martha Diamond. Essay by John Coffey. Brunswick, Maine: Bowdoin College Museum of Art
Martha Diamond. Essay by Stephen Westfall. New York: Robert Miller Gallery
1986 Landscape Seascape Cityscape. Essay by Lowery S. Sims. New Orleans: Contemporary Arts Center
1984 New Art. Phyllis Freeman, Eric Himmel, Edith Pavese and Anne Yarowsky, eds. New York: Harry N. Abrams
MetaManhattan. New York: Whitney Museum of American Art
A Celebration of American Women Artists. Part II: The Recent Generation. New York: Sidney Janis Gallery
Young American Artists from Brooke Alexander Inc. Introduction by Brooke Alexander. Athens, Ohio: Trisolini Gallery of Ohio University
1983 The American Artist as Printmaker. Foreword by Robert T. Buck, essay by Barry Walker. New York: Brooklyn Museum
The Art of New York. Seymour Chwast and Steven Heller, eds.; introduction by James Atlas. New York: Harry N. Abrams
1980 Diamond, Lieberman, Lipski: Recent Works. Clinton, N.Y.: Hamilton College
1979 Sixth British International Print Biennale. Bradford, Eng.: Bradford Art Galleries and Museums
1978 Thick Paint. Essay by Carter Ratcliff. Chicago: The Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago
1974 Tenth Anniversary Exhibition 1964-1974. Ridgefield, Conn.: The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art
1973 Second Annual Contemporary Reflections 1972-73. Ridgefield, Conn.: The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art
1970 Life Magazine. Tom Veitch, ed. New York: The Poetry Project
1969 Best & Company. Bill Berkson, ed. New York: Bill Berkson