Biography
Joel Babb graduated in Art History from Princeton in 1969, studied with George Segal and George Ortman and spent a year in Munich and Rome before going to Boston to get an MFA from the Museum School and Tufts. There his style changed from abstraction to a contemporary realism. His cityscapes are the works for which he is best known in Boston. Some are street level panoramas like the large View of Harvard Square in the Charles Hotel, Cambridge. Others are panoramas from a high prospect like the View from the Roof of 500 Boylston for Mass Financial, or the View from the Financial District at Standish, Ayer and Wood, or the View of Cincinnati done for Gradison Investments. All of the panoramas play with problems of flattening a wide angled space into a picture plane.
In 1984 he began a series of aerial views based on photos he took from a helicopter over Boston. These are often experimental perspectives like the one point perspective straight down of Copley Plunge or the View of Back Bay at Harvard Business School and the two paintings for Fidelity. Copley Plunge is in the collection of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.
In the mid 1970’s he began building a studio and residence in Sumner, Maine which soon became a full time residence. Though he continued to paint cityscapes in the late 1980’s he began a series of large landscapes of the woods near his studio. One is The Hounds of Spring which hangs in Baker Library at Harvard Business School.
In 1996 he finished the painting recreating the first successful organ transplant in man which hangs in the Countway Library at Harvard Medical School, working with the doctors who achieved this important medical innovation. In 2015 he painted a picture of the first successful full face transplant in America for the surgeons at the Brigham and Women’s who accomplished this.
He has had three solo shows at Vose Galleries and been in shows at Naga in Boston, Sherry French, Gerold Wunderlich, The National Academy in New York City, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Portland Museum of Art, the Ogunquit Museum and Frost Gully Gallery in Maine, the Arnot Art Museum, The Naples Museum of Art, Trudy Labell Fine Arts in Florida, and Greenhut gallleries in Portland, and many other galleries and museums.
Exhibitions
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Vose Galleries, Boston, MA, “Water as Muse: Reflections, Refractions, and Flow, ” October 7–November 4, 2017 Vose Galleries, Boston, MA, “Crosscurrents: The Clubs and Schools that Established Impressionism in America,” October 29, 2016–Jan 28, 2017 Vose Galleries, Boston, MA: :Contemporary: At Home and Afield”, August 6–September 24, 2016 Greenhut Galleries, Portland, ME, “The Nature of Things,” October 6–October 29, 2016 Thos. Moser Gallery, Freeport, ME, “The Best of Maine Contemporary Art,” June 17–October 12, 2015 Vose Galleries, Boston, MA,”Lyric Suite: An Easel in the Landscape, New Works by Joel Babb” October 9-November 17, 2012 Vose Galleries, Boston, MA Naples Museum of Art, Naples, FL Bates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, ME Vose Galleries, Boston, MA Vose Galleries, Boston, MA Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockland, ME Bates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, ME Arnot Art Museum DeCordova Museum, Lincoln MA Bates College Museum of Art Davenport Museum of Art John and Mabel Ringling Museum Philbrook Museum of Art Round Top Centerfor the Arts Bates College Museum of Art L.C. Bates Museum”Looking at Katahdin: The Artists’ Inspiration” Bates College Museum of Art Oqunquit Art Museum
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Harvard Medical School – Countway Library – Boston, Frost Gully Gallery – Portland, ME Gerold Wunderlich and Co. – New York Sherry French Gallery – New York Portland Museum of Art – Portland, ME Sherry French Gallery – New York City J.S.Ames Fine Arts – Belfast, ME National Academy of Design – New York City Francesca Anderson Fine Art – Lexington, MA USArtists ’93 – Trudy Labell Fine Art – Philadelphia, PA Barn Gallery – Ogunquit, ME Portland Museum of Art – Portland, ME The Reed Art Gallery – U. of Maine, Presque Isle, ME Maine Coast Artists – Rockport, ME Gallery on the Green – Lexington,MA The Contemporary Arts Center – Cincinnati, OH Hobe Sound Gallery – Brunswick, ME The Art Complex Museum – Duxbury,MA Trudy Labell FineArt – Rehoboth, MA St. Botoloph Club – Boston, MA Hobe Sound Gallery – Brunswick,ME Gallery on the Green – Lexington,MA Fitchburg Art Museum – Fitchburg,MA Gallery on the Green – Lexington,MA Treat Gallery – Bates College – Lewiston, ME
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| Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
American Finance Group – Boston, MA Arthur Anderson – Boston, MA Atlantic Mutual – Madison, NJ Bank of Boston – Boston, MA Bates College – Lewiston, ME Bostongas – Boston, MA Brown Brothers Harriman – Boston, MA Cambridge Savings Bank – Cambridge, M The Charles Hotel – Cambridge, MA Copley Advisors – Boston, MA DeCordova Museum – Lincoln, MA Dynatech Corporation – Burlington, MA Fidelity – Boston, MA FDIC – Boston, MA Fleet Bank – Providence, RI Fogg Art Museum – Cambridge, MA Gradison Financial Services – Cincinnati, OH Hale and Dorr – Boston, MA Harvard Business School – Baker Library |
Harvard Medical School – Countway Library
IBM – Boston, MA Mass Financial Services – Boston, MA Marriott Hotel – Crystal City, VA Motorola Semiconductor – Burlington, MA New England Life – Boston, MA New England Telephone – Boston, MA Partners Healthcare – Boston, MA Peabody and Arnold – Boston, MA Peabody and Brown – Boston, MA Putnam Companies – Boston, MA R.M.Bradley – Boston, MA Shearson American Express – Boston, MA Standish Ayer and Wood – Boston, MA Teradyne Inc.- Boston, MA Tufts New England Medical Center – Boston, MA Wellington Management – Boston, MA Westin Hotel – Copley Place – Boston, MA Private Collections |