Transcript Helen Frankenthaler

Helen Frankenthaler
http://www.deutsche-bankknust.com/guggenhein/alt/05/english/ausstellung/index.html
Abstract Expressionist Painter,
Born 1928
The American painter Helen Frankenthaler is a
second-generation abstract expressionist
widely considered "the country's most
prominent living female artist." A New York City
native, Frankenthaler was graduated from the
Dalton School, where she studied with the
Mexican painter Rufino Tamayo. After earning
her B.A. degree at Bennington College in
Vermont, she moved back to New York. In 1950
Frankenthaler encountered the influential art
critic Clement Greenberg, through whom she
met the major figures in New York's avant-garde
art world. http://www.nmwa.org/collection/profile.asp?linkID=249
HELEN
FRANKENTHA
LER b. 1928
Viewpoint II,
1979
Acrylic on
canvas, 81 1/4
X 94 1/2"
(206.38 X
240.03 cm.)
Signed, lower
right
Gift of Paul and
Suzanne
Donnelly
Jenkins, 989-0108
http://www.butle
rart.com/pc_bo
ok/pages/helen
_frankenthaler_
b.htm
The use of unprimed canvas and the
artist's union of figure and ground were
triggered by an encounter with Jackson
Pollock's black-and-white paintings at
an exhibition at the Betty Parsons
Gallery, New York in 1951. Pollock's
rejection of the conventional brush and
easel encouraged Frankenthaler's more
liberated approach to the canvas.
•
http://www.deutsche-bankknust.com/guggenhein/alt/05/english/ausstellung/index.html
Helen Frankenthaler
American, born 1928
Untitled (study for Postcard for James Schuyler), 1962
Drawing in acrylic, oils, and crayon over a lithograph, on cream paper
19 7/8 x 25 3/4 in. (50.7 x 65.4 cm)
Gift of Mrs. George R. Rowland, Sr., 1994 1994.118
http://www.mfa.org/handbook/portriat.asp?id-378&s=9
• The work of Jackson Pollock proved the decisive
catalyst to the development of her style. Immediately
appreciating the potential, not fully developed by
Pollock, of pouring paint directly onto raw unprimed
canvas, she thinned her paint with turpentine to allow
the diluted color to penetrate quickly into the fabric,
rather than build up on the surface. This revolutionary
soak-stain approach not only permitted the
spontaneous generation of complex forms but also
made any separation of figure from background
impossible since the two became virtually fused a
technique that was an important influence on the work
of other painters, particularly Morris Louis and
Kenneth Noland.
http://www.artchive.com/artchive/ftpoc/frankenthaler_ext.html
Mountains and Sea
1952
Oil on canvas
7' 2 5/8" x 9' 9 1/4"
National Gallery of Art, Washington
http://www.artchive.com/artchive/ftpoc/frankenthaler_ext.html
• By pouring thinned-down paint directly
onto bare canvas that absorbed the
pigment into its fibers, the artist created
breathing landscapes of transparent
planes of color washes. Frankenthaler,
who insists she is not an Action painter,
makes the fluidity of the paint as it seeps
into and through the canvas – not the
gesture of the painter, as in Pollock's drips
– primary to the animation of her work.
http://www.deutsche-bankknust.com/guggenhein/alt/05/english/ausstellung/index.html
Seeing the Moon on a Hot
Summer Day
1987
Acrylic on canvas
8' 7 3/8" x 5' 4 1/4"
Private collection
http://www.artchive.com/artchiv
e/ftpoc/frankenthaler_ext.html
For many years Frankenthaler executed stained
canvases that seem nonrepresentational, but which are
actually based on real or imaginary landscapes. During
the summers, she worked in Provincetown,
Massachusetts, and in the mid-1970s she bought a
second home and studio in Connecticut. In addition to
her two-dimensional work, Frankenthaler produced
welded steel sculptures; she has also explored
ceramics, prints, and illustrated books, and in 1985 she
designed the sets and costumes for a production by
England's Royal Ballet. She has taught at New York
University, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale and has had
numerous one-woman exhibitions of her work,
including important retrospectives at the Whitney
Museum of American Art in 1969 and New York's
Museum of Modern Art in 1989. Frankenthaler has won
many awards and has been the subject of a
documentary film. http:www.nmwa.org/collection/profile.asp?linkID=249
Helen
Frankenthaler
Captain's Watch,
1986
acrylic on canvas
76 3/4 x 58 3/4 in
http://www.acklan
d.org/art/exhibition
s/patton/frankenth
aler.html
Helen Frankenthaler
La Sardana
Lithograph and
etching in 5 colors
1987
35 x 25-3/8 inches
Edition of 60; Signed
and numbered.
$3700.00
http://www.djtfineart.co
m/cgi-bin/fineart/gallery.html?categor
y=frankenthaler&item=
art00503&type=gallery
Helen Frankenthaler
Ramblas
Lithograph and etching
1988
34 x 26 inches
Edition of 75. Signed
and numbered
$3800.00
http://www.djtfineart.
com/cgi-bin/fineart/gallery.html?cate
gory=frankenthaler&
item=art00082&type
=gallery