Larry Rivers was born as Yitzroch Loiza Grossberg in the Bronx, New York in the family of Jewish immigrants from Ukraine.
15 Facts About Larry Rivers
2.
Larry Rivers earned a BA in art education from New York University in 1951.
3.
Larry Rivers's work was quickly acquired by the Museum of Modern Art.
4.
Larry Rivers was a pop artist of the New York School, reproducing everyday objects of American popular culture as art.
5.
Larry Rivers was one of eleven New York artists featured in the opening exhibition at the Terrain Gallery in 1955.
6.
In 1965, Larry Rivers had his first comprehensive retrospective in five important American museums.
7.
Larry Rivers spent 1967 in London collaborating with the American painter Howard Kanovitz.
8.
In 1967, Larry Rivers traveled to Africa for a second time with Pierre Dominique Gaisseau to finish their documentary Africa and I, which was a part of the groundbreaking NBC series Experiments in Television.
9.
Larry Rivers's legs appeared in John Lennon and Yoko Ono's 1971 film Up Your Legs Forever.
10.
Larry Rivers was born in the Bronx to Samuel and Sonya Grossberg, Jewish immigrants from Ukraine.
11.
Larry Rivers changed his name to Rivers in 1940 at the start of his career as jazz saxophonist.
12.
Larry Rivers adopted Berger's son from a previous relationship, Joseph, and reared both children after the couple divorced.
13.
Larry Rivers then lived with Sheila Lanham, a Baltimore artist and poet.
14.
Larry Rivers maintained a relationship with poet Frank O'Hara in the late 1950s and delivered the eulogy at O'Hara's funeral in 1966.
15.
Larry Rivers died in 2002, leaving behind his five children and then companion poet Jeni Olin.