John Chamberlain

For more information on John Angus Chamberlain, visit Britannica.com.

(b Rochester, IN, 16 April 1927). American sculptor, painter, printmaker and film maker. He studied at the Art Institute of Chicago from 1950 to 1952 and from 1955 to 1956 at Black Mountain College, NC, where he was exposed to the modernist aesthetics of the poets Charles Olson (1910-70) and Robert Creeley (b 1926), with whom he formed a lasting friendship. His early welded-iron sculpture was heavily influenced by Abstract Expressionism and by the sculpture of David Smith. In 1957 he moved to New York where he made his first works out of crushed car parts, such as Shortstop (1957; New York, Dia A. Found.), a practice for which he became immediately recognized and recognizable. During the mid-1960s he continued in this mode, expanding its formal vocabulary to include larger free-standing complexes and wall reliefs, always emphasizing fit and spontaneity. This work earned him instant critical association with the JUNK ART movement.

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