Norman Charles Zammitt

Place: Toronto

Born: 1931

Death: 2007

Biography:

Norman Charles Zammitt (February 3, 1931 – November 16, 2007) was an American artist in Southern California who was at the leading edge of the Light and Space Movement, pioneering with his transparent sculptures in the early 1960s, followed in the 1970s by his large scale luminous color paintings. He was born in Toronto, Canada, of Native American and Sicilian descent. When he was 7 years old, the family moved to the Caughnawaga Reservation outside of Montreal and in Buffalo, New York. In 1960, he graduated from Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles and was invited by Felix Landau to join his gallery on the prestigious La Cienega gallery row. Landau also advanced him funds for his first studio in Los Angeles. In 1967, Zammitt received a fellowship from Tamarind Lithography Workshop. In 1968, he received a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. In 1981, he received a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. In 1990, he received a grant from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation. Zammitt's work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York City; the Joseph Hirshhorn Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; the Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, California; the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.; and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California.