Frank Stella, artist renowned for geometric works, dies at 87
Frank Stella, a painter, sculptor and printmaker whose constantly evolving works are hailed as landmarks of the minimalist and post-painterly abstraction art movements, died Saturday at his home in Manhattan.
NEW YORK — Frank Stella, a painter, sculptor and printmaker whose constantly evolving works are hailed as landmarks of the minimalist and post-painterly abstraction art movements, died Saturday at his home in Manhattan. He was 87.
Gallery owner Jeffrey Deitch, who spoke with Stella’s family, confirmed his death to The Associated Press. Stella’s wife, Harriet McGurk, told the New York Times that he died of lymphoma.
Born May 12, 1936, in Malden, Massachusetts, Stella studied at Princeton University before moving to New York City in the late 1950s.
At that time many prominent American artists had embraced abstract expressionism, but Stella began exploring minimalism. By age 23 he had created a series of flat, black paintings with gridlike bands and stripes using house paint and exposed canvas that drew widespread critical acclaim.
Frank Stella's "Concentric Squares," an example of the artist's geometric and structured works, at Christie's in New York City on Friday.Timothy A. Clary / AFP - Getty ImagesOver the next decade, Stella’s works retained his rigorous structure but began incorporating curved lines and bright colors, such as in his influential Protractor series, named after the geometry tool he used to create the curved shapes of the large-scale paintings.
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