The US artist Frank Stella has died at the age of 87. The painter became known for a series of completely black paintings and opened up more and more to colors over the course of his career.
Frank Stella, one of the most important US artists of his generation, has died. The painter died of cancer at home in New York at the age of 87, reported the New York Times and the Washington Post, citing Harriet McGurk, the artist’s wife.
Stella was born in 1936 in a suburb of Boston to a wealthy artist and doctor couple. After studying history, he came to New York because he was attracted to the local scene and artists such as Jasper Johns and Jackson Pollock.
Black becomes colorful
Frank Stella shocked the art world at the end of the 1950s with completely black paintings. They were just “flat surfaces with paint on them – nothing more,” said Stella later, emphasizing that there was no meaning behind them: “What you see is what you see.”
The black images were followed by silver and copper-colored ones. As the 1960s progressed, his pictures became more colorful, including the use of fluorescent acrylic paints. The play with geometric shapes remained constant.
Over the course of his artistic career, Stella’s works became more colorful.
Turning to new ones forms of expression
Later, Stella, who had a studio in Manhattan and one in upstate New York, also made reliefs and large-scale sculptures. In his old age, however, he no longer made his works entirely himself, but instead sent designs to special manufacturers. “Everyone works digitally sooner or later.”
Art hasn’t made him rich, even though some of his works sell for millions, said Stella, who was married twice and had five children. “People get excited about these large sums of money, but almost all artists, even the very successful ones, live hand to mouth. You don’t become an artist to make money. You’d be fooling yourself.”