He has received fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Arts Journalism Program. His paintings were the subject of a retrospective first shown at the Fisher Gallery, University of Southern California in Los Angeles, CA in 2004, then traveling to Columbia College of Art in Chicago, IL and The Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown, OH in 2005. Plagens is the author of two books of art criticism-Sunshine Muse: Art on the West Coast, 1945-70 (University of California Press, 2000) and Moonlight Blues: An Artist's Art Criticism (UMI Research Press, 1986)-as well as a novel, Time for Robo (Black Heron Press, 1999). He lives in New York City with his wife, the painter Laurie Fendrich. Supported By