Cornelia Foss: Biography

 

 

Cornelia Foss was born in Berlin, Germany in 1931. Her first six years were spent in Rome, Italy. ​Next, she attended school in Berlin​ for two years, and then came with her family to America in 1939. She has lived primarily in America since then, and is a resident of New York City and Bridgehampton, Long Island.​ Her husband, Lukas Foss, the composer, died in 2009.​

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Foss studied at the Kann Institute in Los Angeles and at the University of Rome, Italy. Foss has taught at the National Academy of the Arts and at the Art Students League of New York. She continues at the latter. Her latest exhibit was a retrospective in 2015 at the Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, New York.

In 2009, Foss was elected a member of the National Academy of the Arts.  2013 marked the publication of her book, "Cornelia Foss: Ten Years of Paintings and Drawings, 2003-2013." In 2015, Skira-Rizzoli published "Cornelia Foss: A Retrospective." 

Foss had her first solo show at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles, followed by solo shows at the James Goodman Gallery in Buffalo​;​​ t​he Berry-Hill Gallery, New York, NY, The Smithsonian, Washington, D.C.; Boston University; The Huntington Museum, Long Island, NY; The Clark Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Saint Gaudens Museum, Cornish, NH; Glenn Horowitz Gallery, East Hampton, NY; The Patrick and Beatrice Haggerty Museum, Marquette University, Milwaukee​,​W​I; The DFN Gallery, New York, NY; The Gerald Peters Gallery, New York, NY - among others.

Her work is in the permanent collections of the National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C.; The Houston Museum of Art, Houston, TX; The Guild Hall Museum, East Hampton, New York; The Brooklyn Museum; The Wichita Art Museum, Wichita, KS; The Museum of Oklahoma, Oklahoma City, OK; The Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo, NY; The National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C. and The Huntington Museum, Long Island, NY, among other museums.