John Grillo is known as one of the greatest Abstract Expressionist painters to have emerged on the postwar artistic stage. In "Art in the San Francisco Bay Area" Thomas Albright pronounced John Grillo as "perhaps the first and purest 'action painter' on the West Coast and one of the most influential painters of San Francisco's school of Abstract Expressionism". He went on to play a seminal role in the post war Bay Area Abstract Expressionist movement that would revolutionize and forever change American Art. In 1948, Grillo left San Francisco for New York City, where he enrolled in Hans Hofmann's school of painting. Hofmann and Grillo were kindred spirits, sharing a mutual respect for one another's work that was similar in color and expression. Hofmann even owned a number of Grillo's works in his personal collection.
Upon Grillo's returned to the East Coast, he was welcomed into the fold of New York's avant-garde. Sam Hunter, reviewing his solo exhibition of San Francisco work at the Artist's Gallery for The New York Times in 1948, singled Grillo out as a leading figure, writing: "His painting acknowledges no allegiance to tradition, exists in a moment of intensity of explosive abstraction." The same year Grillo arrived in New York he had his first one-man show at the Artist's Gallery. He was also selected for the signal show, "15 Unknowns" at the Kootz Gallery in 1950. He worked for over six decades as a painter, sculptor, printmaker, and art instructor, and is remembered, as critic Donald Kuspit notes, as "the leading master of the second generation of Abstract Expressionists."
Grillo’s bold, energetic Geometric 1; Rhythm of Time Series is a fusion of Op Art with Abstract Expressionist elements. His vibrant palette anchored in yellow, orange, and pink keep the viewer engaged, almost hypnotized while engaging with the concentric circles. Known for his rich palette, especially his legendary shades of yellow, Grillo is considered a major figure in the development of Abstract Expressionism. His approach was always “intuitive, creating works without any preconceived notions of what direction the picture would take.
During the late 1960’s, Grillo’s work shifted from the gestural, action-oriented style that characterized his early Abstract Expressionism to a more structured exploration of geometry. The "Geometric" series features bold, organized compositions, often with repeated shapes and vibrant color contrasts. These works demonstrate Grillo’s interest in rhythm, spatial relationships, and the dynamic interplay of form and color.
With a career spanning more than sixty-five years, John Grillo applied his trademark sophisticated use of color as well as his iconic individuality to our Geometric 1; Rhythm of Time Series. Remarking on the artist’s later works, Trevor Richardson, Director of the Herter Gallery at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, which hosted in 2014 an exhibition entitled “John Grillo: Six Decades” was quoted as saying:
He made some pretty radical shifts during his career, but he always managed to put his imprint on his work… He also made great use of color — his paintings were always distinctive in that way.