Hugh Mesibov

1916 - 2016

BiographyHugh Mesibov was born in Philadelphia. He studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts where he won a scholarship. He later continued his studies at the Barnes Foundation. Mesibov was accepted for the Works Progress Administration Federal Art Project where he remained active from 1937 until 1940. His experimental work in printmaking led to the co- invention, with Dox Thrash, of the Carborundum Print process. He made the first prototype called “Mystic” and his involvement brought him national recognition.

After World War II, Mesibov moved to New York City and he had his first one-man show in 1947 at the Chinese Gallery on 57th Street. During the 1950s Mesibov was exhibiting extensively in major museums throughout the United States under the auspices of the American Federation of Art and the Hallmark Award. In the late 1950s he was working in upstate New York as an art therapist at the Wiltwyck School. In 1959 he moved to Rockland County and began teaching at Rockland Community College where he remained until the late 1980s.

During the 1990s, Mesibov revisited his love for printmaking by experimenting with monotypes, using an interweaving of the spatial elements with high color and intense line. He was the recipient of a grant from the New York State Council of the Arts for works on paper, focusing on monotype. [IFPDA]

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