Carl Morris

Carl Morris was one of the most distinguished Oregon painters. He trained at the Art Institute of Chicago and in Paris and Vienna. After teaching at the San Francisco Art Institute, he was invited in 1938 to run the Spokane Art Center under the Federal Art Project. In the early 1940s he moved to Oregon with his wife, the sculptor Hilda Deutsch (Morris) (1911-1991). During his career Morris received numerous awards including the Austro-American Scholarship, the Werkbund Scholarship, and the Seattle Art Museum-Margaret E. Fuller Award. His works were featured in one-man and group exhibitions worldwide including at the Foundation de Etats-Unis in Paris, Seattle Art Museum, Art Institute of Chicago, and the Sao Paulo (Brazil) Biennial Exhibition.

Over the course of his career, Carl Morris moved from figurative work to full abstraction.

His darkly-painted figurative works gradually gave way to moody abstract paintings informed by nature and poetry and later the Northwest’s geology.