Frank Stella was one of the central figures in postwar American art. A proponent of minimalism and non-representational abstraction, Stella was a painter, printmaker and sculptor.
A native of Massachusetts, Stella attended Phillips Academy in Andover and earned a BA from Princeton, where he studied art and color theory with Josef Albers and Hans Hofmann. Stella frequented New York galleries as a student and was intrigued by the work of Jackson Pollock and Franz Kline, both of whom were at the height of their creative powers in the late 1950s.
After moving to New York in 1958, Stella gravitated toward the geometric abstraction and restrained painting style of Barnett Newman and Jasper Johns.
Johns’s flat, graphic images of common objects such as targets and flags prompt viewers to question the essential nature of representation and whether these pictures are really paintings or simply new iterations of the items themselves. Stella pushed Johns’s reasoning further, considering paintings on canvas as objects in their own right, like sculptures, rather than representations. This led him to reject certain formal conventions, eschewing sketches and often using nontraditional materials, like house paint.
In 1959, Stella created his “Black Paintings,” series, in which bands of black paint are separated by thin, precise stripes of bare canvas. At a time when contemporary painting was all about wild gestures, thick paint and formal abandon, these pieces created a sensation. That same year, Stella's work was included in the exhibition "Sixteen Americans" at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and he joined the roster of artists represented by Leo Castelli Gallery. In 1960, he began introducing color into his work and using unconventionally shaped canvases to complement his compositions.
In his “Eccentric Polygon” series, from 1965 and ‘66, Stella embraces asymmetry and bold color, creating forms delineated by painted fields and by the edges of the canvas. This series was followed by the 1967–70 “Protractor” series, characterized by colorful circles and arcs. Named after the ancient cities whose circular plans Stella had noticed while traveling in the Middle East during the 1960s, these works usually comprised several canvases set flush against one another so that the geometric figures in each section came together in a larger, more complex whole.
Also in the mid-1960s, Stella started exploring printmaking, initially working with Kenneth Tyler, of Gemini G.E.L., and later installing printing equipment in his own studio. In 1968, he created the “V” series of lithographs, which included the print Quathlamba I. Following a solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1970, Stella began working in three dimensions, adding relief elements to paintings, which could almost be considered wall-mounted sculptures.
Stella’s 1970–73 “Polish Village” series was inspired by documentary photos and architectural drawings of Polish synagogues that had been destroyed by Nazis during World War II. The resulting works — composed primarily of paint and cloth on plywood — are more rugged and less polished than his previous series.
Herman Melville's Moby Dick was Stella's muse for a series of three- dimensional works he created in the 1980s in which waveforms, architectural elements and Platonic solids play a prominent role. During this period, Stella embraced a new, exuberant style that is exemplified in "La Scienza della Fiacca."
In 1997, the artist oversaw the creation of the Stella Project, a 5,000-square-foot work inside the Moores Opera House at the University of Houston. A large free-standing sculpture by Stella stands outside the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.
Stella’s work is in the collections of numerous important museums around the world, including New York’s Museum of Modern Art and Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Menil Collection, in Houston; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, in Washington, D.C.; and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. He was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Obama in 2009, and was given the Lifetime Achievement Award in Contemporary Sculpture by the International Sculpture Center in 2011.
Find original Frank Stella art for sale on 1stDibs.
Temor De Orillas Original Plaka Painting on Paper, Signed, 21.75x27.5
By Frank Stella
Located in Aventura, FL
Original plaka painting on paper. Hand signed on front by Tomas Sanchez; also hand signed, titled and dated on verso by Tomas Sanchez. Artwork size: 13 x 19.6 inches (visible artwo...
Paper, Mixed Media
$7,536
H 29.53 in W 68.9 in D 1.38 in
H49: Horitzó El Grau - 21st Century, Contemporary, Collage, Painting, Landscape
By Joan Peris
Located in Barcelona, Catalonia
"Once again we are able to contemplate the unique work of Joan Peris with its imaginative and fresh landscapes. All his paintings are as fascinating as they are unusual, emitting the...
Canvas, Mixed Media
$985
H 24.02 in W 18.12 in D 0.79 in
French School PS 240 Summer in La Baule Van Gogh - Chut les Barbizons!
By bazevian 1
Located in Zofingen, AG
Ps 240 Summer in La Baule Vincent Van Gogh In this luminous and poetic work, it's a powerful layer of meaning through the woman’s swimsuit, which echoes Vincent van Gogh’s Starry Ni...
Canvas, Mixed Media, Oil, Acrylic, Stretcher Bars
$166Sale Price|20% Off
H 5.91 in W 8.67 in D 0.04 in
The way home. 1995, paper, mixed media, 15x22 cm
By Atis Ievins
Located in Riga, LV
The way home 1995, paper, mixed media, 15x22 cm Atis Ievins (1946) The exhibition by artist Atis Ieviņš reminds the very origins of serigraphy technique in Latvian art in the time ...
Mixed Media, Paper
$166Sale Price|20% Off
H 11.42 in W 8.08 in D 0.04 in
Flight over the ground. 1996, paper, mixed media, 29x20.5 cm
By Atis Ievins
Located in Riga, LV
Flight over the ground 1996, paper, mixed media, 29x20.5 cm Atis Ievins (1946) The exhibition by artist Atis Ieviņš reminds the very origins of serigraphy technique in Latvian art ...
Mixed Media, Paper
tempio di Antonino e Faustina
By Daniela Gullotta
Located in Milano, MI
Urbex is the English acronym for urban exploration and is an activity that consists of searching for and locating abandoned infrastructure with the goal of visiting, photographing and conveying its contents, with particular involvement of methodologies from geography, anthropology, sociology to cultural studies. Her works have been in the past approached to the works of Anselm Kiefer (b. 1945) and Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1770), but in Gullotta's paintings the absence of color makes the spaces particularly ethereal, allowing them to be ideally lifted to new places and to new life. We often speak of a "brain drain," but in this case we are truly happy to be able to say that this is a "return," and an important one: an artist of international caliber who has decided to entrust her return to her homeland to Almach Art...
Sandstone
$4,000
H 12 in W 24 in
Waiting - detailed, textured, figurative, mixed media, acrylic on canvas
By Heather Allen Hietala
Located in Bloomfield, ON
Simply gorgeous! Two canoe-shaped vessels appear to traverse the horizontal canvas in this recent series of enigmatic works by Heather Allen Hietala. The na...
Canvas, Paper, Mixed Media, Acrylic
$15,000
H 65 in W 75 in D 1.5 in
"The Path" by Lesley Anne Spowart - Contemporary Figurative in Pink and Pastels
By Lesley Anne Spowart
Located in Carmel, CA
Lesley Anne Spowart (American, born 1957) "The Path" 2022 Oil Paint, Mixed Media, Canvas, Stretcher Bars, Wire The artist signed the bottom left and back of the painting. In The Pat...
Wire
$3,280Sale Price|28% Off
H 36 in W 24 in
CHINOISERIE, bright blue mixed media painting on paper
By Barbara Strasen
Located in New York, NY
Acrylic and collage on Yupo paper
Paper, Acrylic, Mixed Media
$892
H 11.82 in W 15.75 in D 0.79 in
Jungla - Polish Young Art, Contemporary Figurative Painting, Nature, Plants
By Michał Cygan
Located in Salzburg, AT
The source of the young artist Michal Cygan´s art is to be found in the Silesian landscape, both in its material and its cultural dimension. The form of three-dimensional model is gi...
Canvas, Mixed Media
$892
H 15.75 in W 11.82 in D 0.79 in
Familok - Polish Young Art, Contemporary Figurative Painting, People
By Michał Cygan
Located in Salzburg, AT
The source of the young artist Michal Cygan´s art is to be found in the Silesian landscape, both in its material and its cultural dimension. The form of three-dimensional model is gi...
Canvas, Mixed Media
$1,144
H 15.75 in W 20.87 in D 0.79 in
Early River Light, Original Painting, Landscape Art, Tree Lined River Painting
By Nicola Wiehahn
Located in Deddington, GB
The river near me is often spectacular in the early morning, i love painting reflections and water. Early River Light [2021] by Nicola Wiehahn Original and hand signed by the artist Mixed media on heavy water colour paper Image size: H:40 cm x W:53 cm Complete Size of Unframed Work: H:40 cm x W:53 cm x D:2cm Sold Unframed Please note that insitu images are purely an indication of how a piece may look ARTIST BIO: All my life I have painted just about anything. After graduating from Camberwell College of Art I was commissioned to paint murals for an architectural firm and started doing illustrating, model making and scenery painting for advertising agencies with clients such as Ford, Glenlivet and the London Stock Exchange. At the same time I was painting from my own studio and was commissioned to make several dinner services for yacht designer Jon Bannenberg. I have been commissioned to make commemorative bowls for The Queen Mother and the Sultan of Brunei, and designs for companies such as the National Trust, Marks and Spencer and Wedgewood. I have had international exhibitions of paintings and ceramics at Gumps San Francisco, Halls, Kansas City, Saks, New York, Nieman Marcus Dallas and Marshall Fields in Chicago. In London I have exhibited at Liberties Best British...
Paper, Mixed Media
Two Figures (Striped Skirt)
Located in New York, NY
mixed media on wood Artist’s Statement Primarily a painter, I use a hybrid visual language that is both abstract and figurative, and fuse domestic and landscape imagery. I build eccentric formats that promote an improvisational attitude toward composition and playfully references the instability and dislocation characteristic of contemporary life. In my work, as in life, the past permeates the present and the commonplace collides with the enigmatic and inexplicable. I make short experimental films using stop motion technique that incorporates sound as well as written and spoken poetic text. Filmmaking significantly broadens the content of my work, and naturally cross-pollinates with my on going painting projects. Drawing is the core of my studio practice and the engine that drives everything I make. Artist Biography Miriam Hitchcock is a painter and experimental filmmaker whose work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. In 2021 her paintings were profiled and featured on the cover of the book, Artists of the Bay Area Volume 1, published by Jen Tough...
Wood, Mixed Media, Ink, Acrylic