NEW YORK, NY.- Forum Gallery announced its participation at Independent 20th Century, September 4-7, 2025, with a presentation dedicated to four decades of painting by Gregory Gillespie (1936-2000).

Gregory Gillespie painted memorable self-portraits, haunting fantasy landscapes, disturbingly surreal genre scenes and monumental, dimensional paintings, incorporating astonishing trompe l’oeil illusions and imaginary themes. His unerring eye for detail, masterful technique and uncompromising independence combined in deeply personal, often hallucinatory visions of the world. Impossible to categorize, Gregory Gillespie captivated diverse and devoted collectors, critics and curators.

Gregory Gillespie’s first New York exhibition was at Forum Gallery in 1966. The 30-year-old artist was then at the American Academy in Rome on a Fulbright grant, followed by three Chester Dale fellowships. At age forty, Gillespie burst into the national spotlight with a retrospective exhibition at the Joseph H. Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in 1977. Forty solo museum and gallery exhibitions followed. He was shown regularly by the Whitney Museum of American Art, in International exhibitions of American contemporary Art, and a second retrospective, A Unique American Vision, organized by the Georgia Museum of Art traveled to four more diverse institutions in 1999.

Now, twenty-five years after his untimely death by suicide in 2000, Gregory Gillespie’s complex, psychologically charged paintings, propelled by his visual anarchy and consummate skill, are as fresh and compelling as they were during his lifetime.

Coinciding with the fair, on view at Forum Gallery will be highlights of our forthcoming presentation, Gregory Gillespie, an exhibition featuring more than thirty paintings dating from 1963 to 1999. The exhibition opens at 475 Park Avenue on September 12th, continuing through November 8th.

Founded in 2022, the Independent 20th Century is a boutique art fair that brings together select exhibitors in a unique platform that efforts to reframe the canon of 20th Century art by engaging deeply with the ever-evolving story of modern and contemporary art through presentations championing artists who challenged conventional histories. Independent 20th Century takes place at Casa Cipriani in the landmark Battery Maritime Building, built in 1909, at the southern tip of Manhattan.

A feature length film documentary, The Painted Life of Gregory Gillespie, directed by Evan Goodchild, made its European Premiere at Cannes International Film Week Festival in May 2025 where the film won “Best Film Audience Award.” This past July, the film won “Best Feature Documentary Film” at the Doc.Boston Documentary Film Festival, and in August, the film had its New York Premiere at the Greenpoint Film Festival.