Perle Fine (1905 – 1988)

A creator of abstract paintings and collages, Perle did work that inspired peace and serenity by using balanced lines and solid shapes on flat surfaces. She was a highly committed art teacher and spent twelve years as a professor of art at Hofstra University in New York. When she ended this career in her late sixties, she did minimalist collages in a series called “Accordment.”

She was born and raised in the Boston area on a dairy farm, and in her late teens moved to New York City where she took classes at the Art Students League with Kimon Nicolaides. She married fellow student Maurice Berezov, and both became abstract artists but were careful to maintain their own identities with her keeping her own name.

She studied with Hans Hofmann, Abstract Expressionist, but disagreed with his ideas and searched for her own less explosive mode of expression. Eventually, she was befriended by Hilla Rebay of the Guggenheim Foundation and with Rebay’s influence was the recipient of some of those funds. At the Guggenheim Museum, Fine became a friend of Jackson Pollock, who was working as a guard and whose painting style was then shocking to most viewers.

She had her first one-person show in 1945 at the Willard Gallery. In 1954, she became associate professor of art at Hofstra University and moved to an art colony on Long Island called the Springs. She painted until she was in her late seventies and died at age eighty.

Source:
American Women Artists by Charlotte Strafer Rubinstein

Biography from the Archives of AskART