Emil Ganso
(1895-1941)
Emil Ganso was born in Germany in 1895. He emigrated to the United States at age 17, working in bakeries in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Cincinnati and Akron, Ohio. Eventually he moved to New York City, living a bohemian lifestyle, often earning less then 30 cents a week. In 1914, Ganso enrolled in the National Academy’s School of Fine Arts. His work there caught the attention of Erhard Weyhe, who bought his entire portfolio for his gallery. Ganso’s work was exhibited at Weyhe’s Gallery from 1925-1936. Weyhe’s patronage afforded Ganso to become a full-time artist, and he spent his summers teaching classes in printing at the Woodstock artist’s colony. From 1936-1937, Ganso was also part of the Federal Arts Project in New York. Ganso had an accomplished career with several solo exhibitions at galleries and museums, including the Washington Irving Gallery in 1960; a retrospective at the Whitney in 1941; a retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum in 1944; and the William Bento Museum of Art at the University of Connecticut in 1976. His work is in the permanent collections of the Biblioteque National in Paris; Boston Museum of Fine Arts; the Brooklyn Museum; the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the New York Public Library; the Museum of Modern Art in New York; and the Whitney Museum of American Art. In 1938, Ganso was awarded the Pennell Memorial Medal by the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Ganso began teaching at Lawrence College in Wisconsin in 1940, but his career there was cut short by his death in 1941.