B I O
For a selected bibliography of Franceschi's work, click here.
Arriving in New York City from Puerto Rico in 1969, Edgar Franceschi was thrilled with the richness and incredible vibrancy of the art scene in the city. Not to mention the personal and sexual revolution that permeated New York City at that moment.
He has had a multifaceted career, working in the theater , television, movies and the visual arts,using a number of mediums: painting, sculpture, set and costume design, ceramic and printmaking.
Franceschi has had seventeen solo exhibitions in New York, Chicago, Washington, D. C., Toronto, New Haven, San Juan and Spartanburg, S. C. Reviewing his eight year retrospective at El Museo del Barrio in 1998, John Russell in The New York Times wrote: "The eight year retrospective of paintings, sculptures, mixed- media objects and a complete stage set by Edgar Franceschi at El Museo del Barrio is an event that honors both the artist and the museum. In every way, Mr. Franceschi is a good man to have around. But perhaps the surrealizing compound object is his forte, after all-witness one called The Perspective of the Moon with the Boring Parts Left Out. That title raises expectations, and Mr. Franceschi lives up to them."
Besides The New York Times, Franceschi's work has been reviewed in Art in America, Artforum, Arts Magazine, Art News, Art and Auction, Art New England, Cortland Standard and various other publications.
His association with Charles Ludlam's Ridiculous Theatrical Company began in 1971 and continued until Ludlam's death in 1987. At that time, Franceschi was designing the sets for a Public Theater Shakespeare in the Park production (Titus Andronicus) that Ludlam would have staged at the
Delacorte Theater in NYC.
For a number of years, Franceschi worked on The Late Show with Dave Letterman, creating unusual props and gadgets for the show. His work on television also included Law and Order, Saturday Night Live and number of television commercials.
Franceschi is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts grants (1981, 1983) and a Sponsored Project Award from the New York State Council on The Arts (1987). In 1981 he was awarded a Creative Artists Program Service Fellowship in sculpture. He was nominated three times for The Awards in the Visual Arts. For three years he was a painting and sculpture panelist for the Visual Arts Program of the New York Council on the Arts.
He attended Alfred University, Hunter College, The George Washington University (MFA), the Corcoran School of Art, Greenwich House Pottery, Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and
the University of Puerto Rico.
Franceschi's work is represented in a wide range of private and public collections including The Grey Art Gallery and Study Center, New York University; The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Lincoln Center, N Y; El Museo del Barrio, NY, etc.
Some of Franceschi's theatrical work can be seen in the following books:"RIdiculous! The Theatrical Life and Times of Charles Ludlam" by David Kaufman,Applause, NYC 2202 and" Bedlam Days, TheEarly Plays of Charles Ludlam" by Leandro Katz, Viper's Tongue, Madrid 2019.