Frank Stella, master of minimalism, has died. He shaped the art of the 20th century – Corriere.it

In a few days, on May 12th, he would have been 88 years old. With Frank Stella, who died of lymphoma in his home in the West Village in New York on Saturday, May 4th, one of the most important American artists of the 20th century, certainly one of the great masters of minimalism, dies. Born on May 12, 1936, in Malden, Massachusetts, to a couple of Italian descent (his father, Frank, a gynecologist; his mother, Constance Aida Santonelli, a housewife who had attended design school) F
Rang Philip Stella is best known for his use of geometric patterns and shapes in the creation of paintings and sculptures (From the 1990s he also began to experiment with the field of architecture, which he had already come into contact with in the 1950s while working in Richard Meier’s studio.) In his works, Stella used form, color and composition – according to critics – to explore non-literary narratives as seen in his works Harrar II (1967) series Protractor.

After completing his studies at the Phillips Academy in Andover (Massachusetts) and Princeton University, he settled in New York in 1958, where he came into contact with the representatives of the new abstraction (Kenneth Noland, Ellsworth Kelly). he had engaged in rigorous geometric research (The connection between reason and misery, 1959, New York, Museum of Modern Art). A research that would have allowed him to develop shaped canvases and create complex color plays (Sanbornville II, 1966, Münster, Western State Museum). The restoration – again according to critics – also of the Stella image dimension (to which In 2009, US President Barack Obama awarded the National Medal of Arts) With unprecedented freedom of expression, complex three-dimensional structures of often monumental size are created, using heterogeneous materials such as felt, wood, aluminum, recycled elements, metallic or fluorescent colors (The Moby Dick Deckle Edges series, 1993; the decorations for the new Princess of Wales Theater in Toronto, 1993). In 2001, one of his monumental sculptures was installed in front of the National Gallery of Art in Washington.

A few months ago, in March, Stella married (from 1961 to 1969 the art historian Barbara Rose, with whom he had two children, Rachel and Michael; then in 1978 he married the pediatrician Harriet McGurk, with whom he had two more children, Peter). and Patrick). a new solo exhibition at the Jeffrey Deitch Gallery in New York (Current sculpture open until May 18th). Where this minimalist artist by definition (in his private collection, works by Mir and Hockney) had brought to life five large sculptures, created (in his Hudson Valley studio) using new technologies, a testament to his contemporaneity evergreen.