Art is divine
Freedom in Colors
by Alessandra Cenna
PALAZZO STROZZI
Florence - Italy
from September 27, 2024 to January 26, 2025
HELEN FRANKENTHALER
DIPINGERE SENZA REGOLE
Helen Frankenthaler Ocean Drive West #1 - 1974 - acrylic on canvas - cm 238.8 × 365.8 - New York, Helen Frankenthaler Foundation © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Robert Motherwell Summertime in Italy - 1960 - oil paint and black pencil on paper -
cm 148.4 × 107.9 - Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art. The Nancy Lee and Perry Bass Fund, 1999.55.4 -
© Dedalus Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Helen Frankenthaler in her Provincetown studio, summer 1968, with Summer Banner (on wall) Spices (in hand) and Summer Core (foreground). Photograph by Alexander Liberman; © J. Paul Getty Trust. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (2000.R.19). Artwork © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
In the heart of Florence, the Palazzo Strozzi Foundation presents in its magnificent Renaissance residence the largest exhibition ever dedicated in Italy to the major artist of Abstract Expressionism, Helen Frankenthaler (1928 - 2011).
The Florentine exhibition «Helen Frankenthaler: Painting without rules» displays a vast collection of paintings created from 1953 to 2002, coming from the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, very important museums around the world and private collections.
Her large canvases interact with the creations of other contemporary artists such as Anthony Caro, Morris Louis, Anne Truitt and Jackson Pollock. Born in New York, Helen Frankenthaler studied art with the Mexican painter Rufino Tamayo at the Dalton School and then joined Bennington College in Vermont with Paul Feeley who introduced her to Cubism.
She finally began in New York in an artistic atmosphere deeply dominated by the male presence.
Helen Frankenthaler Alassio 1960 - Oil on canvas - cm 216.5 × 332.7 - New York, Helen Frankenthaler Foundation © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
She then frequented the creative avant-garde of Manhattan, in particular Barnett Newman, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and of course Robert Motherwell who would become her husband in 1958. His role was very important for a whole generation of painters. Indeed, she bridged the gap between Abstract Expressionism of the 1950s and the Color Field Painting movement of the 1960s, of which she was the creator.
Thanks to the “soak stain” technique, an innovative technique initiated by her famous painting, Mountains & Sea, when she was only 23 years old.
She then created large stained or soaked canvases in very bright colors.
She poured the pigments and paint directly onto her canvas, sometimes using buckets, then spread it using sponges, brushes and her own hands in order to create shapes and spots of color which, in soaking into the frame, brought it to life with effects of astonishing fluidity.
Helen Frankenthaler The Human Edge - 1967 acrylique sur toile - cm 314,9 × 237,1 - Syracuse, NY, Everson Museum of Art, Museum purchase to honor Director, Max Sullivan on the opening of the IM Pei building, 68.23 - © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Helen Frankenthaler Mornings 1971- acrylic on canvas - cm 294.6 × 185.4 New York, Helen Frankenthaler Foundation © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Helen Frankenthaler Solar Imp - 1995 - acrylic on paper -cm 198.1 × 151.8 - New York, Helen Frankenthaler Foundation © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Helen Frankenthaler Matisse Table - 1972 - steel - cm 209.6 × 134.6 - New York, Helen Frankenthaler Foundation © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Apioneer of this technique, she defied all conventions and all academic rules. She thus wove a true and intimate relationship between shapes and colors.
Her painting is abstract and yet the beauty of nature emerges in her paintings which evoke cliffs, seasides and colorful beaches.
Her works were often judged too soft and too feminine by her contemporaries but she demonstrated that art in its abstraction can exist far from all forms of cynicism and coldness.
In her sculptures, she was able to imprint this roundness and this carnal musicality which marks all her creations imbued with the power and freedom of the sacred feminine.
Helen Frankenthaler Star Gazing - 1989 - acrylic on canvas -cm 181.6 × 365.8 - New York, Helen Frankenthaler Foundation © 2024 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Helen Frankenthaler
Dipingere senza regole - Peindre sans règles
Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi
Florence - Italie
du 27 septembre 2024 au 25 janvier 2025
www.palazzostrozzi.org