Reviews / The Chicago Sun Times

March 1981

Harold Hayden

Ronald Markman, the long-neglected father of Chicago imagist painting, has a splendid show of his “assembled” paintings at the Dart Gallery, 155 E. Ohio, through April 1. From 1960 to 1964, Markham (sic) taught Imagists-to-be in the School of the Art Institute, before taking his present post at Indiana University. As rich as Persian miniatures and as complex as Oriental rugs, Markham’s paintings are assemblages of painted circles, blocks and strips of wood. Highly decorative, at a short distance their borders resolve into mazes of little, zany figures, letters, words and phrases only visible at close range. Clearly, the master is much better at this game—and more refined—than his followers.