'Parallel Lines' and dueling documents
by Mary Voelz Chandler (InDenver Times)
Pirate: Contemporary Art is all lit up with striking art right now, thanks to the effort of artists who wanted to pay tribute to the late Dale Chisman ... Finally, taking up most of the wall to the right are the works by Polanco, with their complicated tangles of line and color, Chisman’s striking yellow and black acrylic on canvas Jerusalem, above, as well as pieces that show a mix of the two men’s approaches, from Chisman’s broad stroke to Polanco’s more precise lines and forms.

Chisman's death leaves a void
By Mary Voelz Chandler (Rocky Mountain News)
When I began writing about art 15 years ago for the Rocky Mountain News, there was no question who I'd focus on first. It had to be Dale Chisman, whose work I had admired even before art became my work. For one thing, this accomplished artist created abstract paintings and works on paper, art that pulled me in like a cat to cream. For another, Chisman had two important shows going on, one at what was then called the CU Art Galleries, the other at the (sadly) long-defunct Grant Gallery on Market Street in Denver.

Dean of Colorado abstraction Dale Chisman dies after a long illness
By Michael Paglia (Westword)
Without question, Chisman was one of the most important artists to have ever worked in Colorado. And though he was only in his sixties, he provided a bridge to the artists of the mid-twentieth century, because he had been their student. He'd studied with the late Martha Epp at North High School, and later spent a summer working with Mary Chenoweth, now also deceased, at Colorado College. He received both his BFA and MFA from the University of Colorado in Boulder, but left the area for many years, living for a time in London and for many years in New York before he returned to Colorado in the 1980s, and almost immediately established himself as a local master.

Abstract intrigue:
A show celebrates the worlds envisioned by Dale Chisman
By Kyle MacMillan (Denver Post)
Unlike portrait or landscape artists who endeavor to re-create the world around them, abstractionists invent their own visual worlds. It is not easy. Dozens, maybe even hundreds of artists in Colorado pursue such nonobjective art, yet only a few have built a truly distinctive body of work and achieved real national recognition.

One is Dale Chisman, whose 3 1/2-decade career is being celebrated through Jan. 14 with an exhibition at the Rule Gallery that combines five of his early New York paintings, from 1975-78, with eight recent works.

"There is always some kind of surprise,” Payton said of his work. “It’s not rote. So many artists get kind of formulaic, and he doesn’t. It just continues to be impressive.” Cydney Payton, director-curator of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver.

Dale Chisman's impressive career is on display at Rule.
By Michael Paglia (Westword)
Chisman has a dead-on instinct for putting colors together and for assembling forms. He does both of these things instinctually, not knowing how his paintings will come out until the end. The results are almost always brilliant and beautifully crafted.

New York years colored Chisman's work
By Mary Voelz Chandler (Rocky Mountain News)
Even before looking at art became a way to make a living, it certainly was a way to make a life. And when writing about art became part of my way to make a living here years ago, the first artist I wanted to write about was Dale Chisman.

That's because I was so impressed by his paintings, where he created his own vocabulary of symbols, expansive works where every mark was just so (and just so important) in the composition, and where there was so much going on beneath the surface of each painting. I could fall into them for hours.