Keith Achepohl

Keith Achepohl (1934-)
"Flora"
Etching, n.d.
LFAC #900

Biography

Keith Achepohl was born April 11, 1934, in Chicago. He earned as BA from Knox College in Galesburg, IL, and in 1960 received an MFA in printmaking from the University of Iowa, where he studied with Mauricio Lasansky. He also holds DFA degrees from Knox College (1996) and Pacific Lutheran University (1989). From 1964-67 he served as a printmaking instructor at the University of Iowa, returning to the school in 1973, where he is currently full professor and head of the printmaking department. Since 1996 he has served as director of the University of Iowa Summer in Venice Program. In 2001 the University named him the Elizabeth M. Stanley Professor in the Arts.

Works by Achepohl can be found in more than 80 museum, institutional, and corporate collections around the world, including the National Gallery of Art & Pennell Collection, Library of Congress, Washington, DC; the Los Angeles County Museum, California; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid, Spain, and the Kobe Art Museum, Kobe, Japan. His extensive exhibition list includes the National Print Exhibition, Library of Congress (1960, 61, 63 & 69); the Brooklyn Museum (1968-74); the Utah Museum of Fine Arts (1980); the Art Institute of Chicago (1981); Honolulu Academy Art Exhibition, Japan (1990); Egyptian National Museum (1990); Gonzaga University (1996); Western Illinois University (1997); Washburn University (1997); the Davenport Art Museum, IA (1998); and Percival Gallery, Des Moines, IA (1997). In 1966 he received a Tiffany Foundation Award, and has twice been the recipient of Fulbright Senior Lectureship Awards, first to Cairo, Egypt (1979-80) and then to Ankara, Turkey (1984). In 1982 he won the Gold Medal for Printmaking at the Mediterranean Biennale, Alexandria, Egypt, and in 1990 received the Edmondson Award from the Des Moines Art Center.

Achepohl is known primarily for his watercolors and prints. Much of his work is informed by extensive travels in the Mediterranean region, in particular Egypt and Turkey. His watercolor series, Egypt Day and Night, abstracts the geometry of the region’s architecture and infuses it with sensuous color. Other works reflect his interest in nature through the sensitive depiction and interpretation of plant forms.

There is one work by Achepohl in the Luther Fine Arts Collection. Flora is a large, color intaglio print in the figurative tradition established by Mauricio Lasansky at the University of Iowa. The print was given to the college by Alan Luloff in 1991, in memory of his wife, Trudy Souden Luloff (LC ’70), deceased, cousin of the artist.

Ref: Iowa Alumni Magazine, University of Iowa, June 2000; Arts & Sciences, University of Iowa, Fall 2001; Marquis Who’s Who in American Art 2001-2002, New Providence, NJ.

Updated 01/14/2009