The painter, graphic artist sculptor and object artist Red Grooms is also active in other genres such as film, performance and installation art. He is a very popular representative of American Pop-Art.
Red Grooms was born by the name Charles Rogers in Nashville/Tennessee in 1937. The fact that Charles Rogers became known as "Red" is owed to his hair color.
Red Grooms began to study at the Art Institute in Chicago at the age of 18. At that time he was interested in the oeuvre of Jean Dubuffet and in Art Brut in general. In 1956 Red Grooms transferred to the Peabody College in Nashville and the New School for Social Research in New York, in 1957 Red Grooms attended a summer course with Hans Hofmann in Provincetown.
In his early period of creation in the 1950s Red Grooms made abstract wooden figures that called reminiscence of Picasso and paintings in the style of Abstract Expressionism that inspired by Georges Mathieu. At the end of the decade Red Grooms was active in the circle around Allen Kaprow and was involved in the new art form of Happenings, along with artists such as Claes Oldenburg or Jim Dine. Red Grooms approaches Happenings from a theater perspective, and the experience gained in Action art also inspired his Environment painting, which calls reminiscence of stage scenarios. In the 1960s and 1970s Red Grooms began to work as film artist. Worthwhile mentioning are the pictures "Shoot the Moon" (1962) or "Ruckus Manhattan" (1976).
Under the title of the latter Red Grooms worked on a "sculptural Novel", an artistic portrait of New York as of the mid 1970s. Some 30 artists, amongst them also Mimi Gross, Red Grooms' wife, were involved in the project.
The city of New York remained an important subject of Red Grooms' art, which he captured in his famous extensive plate pictures. In these works he unites painting, relief and sculpture to miniature city scenes, at times they were executed in editions. Additionally, Red Grooms applied the method to monumental works in public space.
Red Grooms is also an acclaimed drawer, who uses color pencils and watercolors to make panopticons in a comic-like style. Graphic art is yet another field of activity for Red Grooms, who sought a "postmodern" reference to the main works of art history in the 1990s.
Works by Red Grooms, who was awarded the "NAD Lifetime Achievement Award" in 2003, are represented in renowned museums such as the New York institutions Guggenheim Museum, Metropolitan Museum and Museum of Modern Art. Red Grooms lives and works in New York.