Lawrence Kupferman

Lawrence Kupferman (1909–1982) was an American painter associated with the Boston Expressionist school in the early 1940s, and later, with Abstract Expressionism. He chaired the Painting Department at the Massachusetts College of Art, where he was known for introducing innovative practices and techniques.

Early life and education

Kupferman was born in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston in 1909, the son of Samuel and Rose Kupferman.

Kupferman attended the Boston Latin School and took part in the high school art program at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. In the late 1920s he studied drawing under Philip Leslie Hale at the Museum School (an experience he called "stultifying and repressive"). In 1932 he transferred to the Massachusetts College of Art, where he first met his wife, the artist Ruth Cobb. In the 1940s he began incorporating more expressionistic forms into his paintings, and from then on his work became increasingly abstract. In 1946 he began spending summers in Provincetown, Massachusetts, where he met and was influenced by Mark Rothko, Hans Hofmannn,

Among the other speakers were Karl Knaths, H. W. Janson, Zerbe, Levine, and Aronson. the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Fogg Museum, Kupferman's papers at the Archives of American Art include an unpublished historical novel, Beggar's Bread, which depicts the Boston art scene of the 1930s.