Visual artist Josh Dorman lives and works in New York City and the Catskills. He received a M.F.A. from Queens College and a B.A. from Skidmore College. His work is represented by Ryan Lee Gallery in New York City and he teaches art at The Spence School.
Dorman’s work is included in museum collections such as the Minneapolis Institute of Art, The Springfield Museum, The Tang Museum, The Butler Institute, and the Naples Museum. He’s had solo exhibitions at the Longview Museum of Fine Art in Texas, the Craft and Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles, and Hallwalls in Buffalo. His work has been in group shows at The Drawing Center, Torrance Art Museum, Katonah Museum, Swarthmore College Museum, Weatherspoon Museum, and The National Academy. His shows have been reviewed in ArtNews, Art in America, LA Times, BOMB Magazine, The Paris Review, Modern Painters, ArtForum, and The New Yorker. He’s been the subject of essays by acclaimed authors such as Paul Auster, Michael Chabon, and Nam Le. From 2009 to 2014, Dorman created seven animated short films to accompany Anna Clyne’s The Violin, and he executed a public art installation at One New York Plaza in New York in 2014.
He is a recipient of a NYFA grant in 2009, and has been awarded residencies at MacDowell, Yaddo, I-Park, Millay Colony, and Art Omi. He received a Pollock-Krasner grant in 2023. He’s been a visiting lecturer at The Art Academy London, Skidmore College, Maryland Institute of Art, the Welch School of Art & Design, and Mass Art. In 2021, Dorman was featured in long-form pieces in The Smithsonian Archives of American Art Journal and the Harvard Advocate.
At MacDowell in 2019, Dorman completed several paintings for his 2019 show at Ryan Lee Gallery (NYC). He also continued his series of portraits of “Dementia,” which were to be exhibited in 2019 at the Longview Museum of Art in Texas. Finally, Dorman continued his work on paintings inspired by Charles Burchfield. Commissioned by the Smithsonian Archives of American Art Journal for a 10-page spread, Dorman chose a single image from the archives (a holiday card watercolor) as a springboard for an entire body of work. In residence, he read Burchfield's journals extensively and traveled to the MFA Boston to view The Winter Bouquet, the source for Burchfield's image.
During his 2025 residency, he worked on 10 paintings (incorporating antique collage materials) continuing his “Idyll/Idol” series that was exhibited at Ryan Lee Gallery in 2024. This sabbatical year allowed him to also attend the Arctic Circle Residency, UCross, and Cil Rilaig residencies. Dorman is currently collaborating on a Charles Burchfield inspired animation project with Lynn Tomlinson.
