Notes: Abstract Expressionism and the New York School were newly established by the time George Morrison graduated from the Art Students League in 1946. Morrison responded enthusiastically to this new artistic paradigm that resisted confinement and rule. He flourished under this canopy of spontaneity and exploration. As a Post-War artist, Morrison became a figure in New York. He made friendships with Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline, Jackson Pollock and Louise Nevelson. He showed regularly in group shows and had nine solo exhibitions between 1948 and 1960 at Grand Central Moderns Gallery in New York City.

Morrison found and developed a distinct style in abstraction and continually pushed his creative boundaries. This body of work was primarily executed between 1957 - 1964. Summer Spectrum II is an early, seminal example defined by color field variations built from impasto layers of abstraction that predates the latter horizon landscapes that emerged in his career. This work is less common for the period in that Morrison depicts a horizon line meandering through the center creating a sense of reflection in water. The color choice is among the most beautiful we have seen by the artist. It is warm and uplifting while maintaining the color contrast and variation within the layers that Morrison is so well known for. 

In the book, Native Modernism, Gail Trembley (Onondaga/Mi’kmaq) expresses Morrison’s influence on art history by saying “Artists are born into peoples and nations, and with their visions they shape the art and culture of those nations. They work to invent the art movements that influence the century they inhabit. Morrison brought the mainstream American art scene home and let a whole generation of contemporary artists from indigenous nations across the United States know that they too could help shape and define movements in American art. He made the generation of Indian artists that followed him aware that it was possible to free oneself from the need to make art about being Indian. He made them aware that whatever they made, it would be indigenous art because they made it. That lesson has been an incredibly powerful one.”