LONDON.- Pace Gallery announced its representation of Amsterdam-based, American-born painter Jo Baer. Over her six-decade-long career in painting, Baer has embraced and advanced a broad range of formal and conceptual pursuits after first emerging as a key figure among the Minimalists working in New York in the 1960s and 70s. In 1975, Baer left New York for Europe and began to introduce images to her paintings, pursuing a self-coined approach of “radical figuration,” which the artist has continued to advance in her work for over thirty years.

“It is with great pleasure that we announce our representation of Jo Baer. Jo is one of the pioneers who staked everything on a new vision of art in the late 1950s in reimagining the purpose and potential of painting.” said Marc Glimcher, Pace Gallery President and CEO. “Her rigorous and energetic compositions in the following decades paved the way for a radical transformation in the late 1970s. These blank paintings demonstrate the common wellspring of abstraction and representation which currently drives so much of the dialogue for painters of this generation. We are excited to bring the work of this great artist to a larger audience in group and solo exhibitions, internationally.”

Trained in Gestalt psychology, Baer’s early non-objective canvases emphasize the physiological experience of painting, while highlighting the illusory potential of a seemingly blank, or flat, space. However, in 1975, concerned with Minimalism’s ability to remain relevant in a changing world, Baer left New York and simultaneously took a radical departure from hard abstraction in favor of an image-based painting practice. Since settling in Amsterdam in 1984, Baer’s work has concentrated on large-scale compositions that straddle abstraction and figuration, integrating visual material, texts, found images and symbols in an uncompromising pursuit of painting’s formal and linguistic capacity to communicate meaning.

Prior to joining Pace, Baer was advised by Art Agency Partners. AAP provides advisory services for living artists as well as artists’ estates and foundations to guide them through all aspects of legacy planning and is committed to serving a broad range of artists including those who have been historically underrepresented.

Allan Schwartzman, Founder and Principal of AAP shared: “Having worked intensively with Jo Baer for a year and a half to create a long-term strategic plan for thoughtful stewardship of her great and important artistic and intellectual output over the last 60 years, and to contextualize her singular and complexly varied art practice and legacy, we are so pleased for Jo to be represented in New York City and globally by such a storied and statured gallery as Pace.”