Fall 2026 Alex Katz Chair in Painting Aaron Gilbert gives an artist talk about their work. Gilbert is known for depicting scenes from private everyday life while invoking the weight of institutional forces, setting intimate narratives against the fluorescent glow cast by the iconography of feudal late-stage technocapitalism. Gilbert’s paintings capture the visual framework of his Brooklyn microcosm and the characters that populate it with a hyper-specificity that advances from the social realism of Gustave Courbet, Otto Dix, and George Tooker, focusing on the transformative potential of individuals and love as a transcending power amid a social infrastructure dictated by commodity fetishism.  

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Gilbert received a B.F.A. in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in 2005 followed by a M.F.A. in painting from Yale University in 2008. Gilbert also holds an Associate of Science in Mechanical Engineering Technology from Penn State University (2000). Gilbert’s work has been exhibited with Gladstone, New York and Brussels; David Kordansky, Los Angeles; Sadie Coles HQ, London; Sant’Andrea de Scaphis, Rome; PPOW Gallery, New York; Chris Sharp Gallery, Los Angeles; Lyles & King, New York; and Deitch Projects, New York. Gilbert’s work is in major public collections including the Whitney Museum of American Art, Brooklyn Museum, Hammer Museum, Studio Museum in Harlem, Columbus Museum of Art, High Museum, RISD Museum, and Museum Brandhorst. Aaron Gilbert has also been the recipient of many awards including the Colene Brown Art Prize in 2022, Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant in 2015, and was named the 2010 “Young American Painter of Distinction” by the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Gilbert has held residencies at Fountainhead Residency (2013), Yaddo (2012), Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Workspace Residency (2008), and American Academy in Rome Affiliate Fellowship (2008).