Gregory Gillespie; Artist Known for Psychologically Charged Self-Portraits

Gregory Gillespie, 64, an artist who mixed realism fueled by a harsh scrutiny with Expressionist distortion and Surrealistic juxtaposition to create some often bizarre paintings. In a 31-year career, Gillespie painted street scenes, landscapes, portraits, and sexual and religious allegories in a broad range of styles. Born in New Jersey to Roman Catholic parents, Gillespie often said his repressive upbringing was responsible for the moral tone of his art. Many of his works were psychologically charged self-portraits. He attended the Cooper Union in Manhattan, N.Y., with the intention of becoming a commercial artist, but visits to the Museum of Modern Art attracted him to painting. After earning a master’s degree at the San Francisco Art Institute, where he studied with Richard Diebenkorn, among others, Gillespie received several grants that allowed him to work in Florence and Rome. His work was shown in La Jolla in 1984 and his first retrospective was at the Hirschhorn Museum in 1977. His work is represented in the collections of museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. On Wednesday, an apparent suicide, at his home in Belchertown, Mass.