Alan Magee

Alan Magee was born in 1947 in Newtown, Pennsylvania, attended Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia and, in 1968, began working as an editorial and book illustrator in New York. Among his regular clients were Time Magazine, The Atlantic, Playboy, New York Magazine, The New York Times, McCall’s, and Avon, Ballantine, and Simon and Schuster Books. His illustrations received numerous awards from the Society of Illustrators, Communication Arts magazine, and the Art Directors’ Clubs of Los Angeles, Chicago and New York. Magee’s illustrations were honored with Playboy’s Annual Editorial Award in 1977, and an American Book Award in 1982.

Alan Magee has received awards for his painting from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters and the National Academy of Design. Several television documentaries have been made about his work including the Maine PBS production, Alan Magee: Visions of Darkness and Light, and Maine Masters: Alan Magee. The artist’s most recent documentary, Alan Magee: art is not a solace, premiered at the International Camden Film Festival in September 2019.  Magee has been interviewed on Voice of America Radio, Monitor Radio in NY, WHYY in Philadelphia, Pacifica Radio in San Francisco, and on WERU in Maine.

Forum Gallery has represented Alan Magee since 2001, presenting seven one-person exhibitions for the artist. In 2020, Alan Magee: Witness, was presented in a cross-platform exhibition and Online Viewing Room, featuring nine powerful paintings of helmets and weaponry paired with the Artist’s haunting monotypes. In 2003-04, the artist was the subject of a major retrospective exhibition, organized by the Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, ME, which traveled to the James A. Michener Art Museum, Bucks County, PA, The Museum of Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX and The Frye Art Museum, Seattle, WA. The accompanying book, a Forum Gallery publication, has sold more than 3,000 copies. A one-person exhibition, Alan Magee: From the Underground River, was presented by the Center for Maine Contemporary Art in 2006. His work has also recently been included in exhibitions at the American Academy of Arts & Letters in New York, the New Britain Museum of American Art in New Britain, CT, the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, PA and at galleries throughout the world.

Alan Magee has received numerous awards for his paintings and his work is in many public collections including the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (CA), The Art Institute of Chicago (IL), Portland Museum of Art and Farnsworth Art Museum (ME), Arkansas Art Center (Little Rock, AR), DeCordova Museum (Lincoln, MA), Huntington Museum of Art (WV), and Columbus Museum of Art (OH). Several television documentaries have been made about his work including the Maine PBS production, “Alan Magee: Visions of Darkness and Light,” and “Maine Masters: Alan Magee.” Most recently, a feature documentary about the artist, Alan Magee: art is not a solace, premiered at the International Camden Film Festival in September 2019.

Alan Magee currently lives and works in Maine.