About the Artist

Born in Malden, Massachusetts, Frank Stella became a leading Abstract Expressionist in New York in the 1950s and 60s and later adopted more complex formats with shaped canvases and geometric arrangements. Most characteristic of him are his changing styles and subjects within the bounds of abstraction. In his constant explorations, he has been described as going from "minimalist" to "maximalist." He attended Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts where he studied with Patrick Morgan and Princeton University, where he was a student of William Seitz and Stephen Greene. In 1958 he moved to New York and was early influenced by Jackson Pollock and Franz Kline. In 1970 at the age of thirty three. he was given his first retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, and that same year he began his three-dimensional relief paintings. His work is in many collections including the Chicago Art Institute, Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. --Excerpted from AskART