Frank (Philip) Stella

Painter, born in Malden, Massachusetts, USA. The nephew of Joseph Stella, he studied art at Princeton (1954–8), settled in New York City (1958), and worked as a house painter. He produced abstract ‘pin-stripe’ works (1959), such as ‘The Marriage of Reason and Squalor’ (1959), painted his ‘black’ series (c.1960), and soon was experimenting with shaped canvases and copper and aluminium paint. In 1964–5 he created his ‘Notched V’ series, and later began his large sculptural wall reliefs, ‘The Indian Bird Series’ (1977–8). His later work was three-dimensional.

Frank Philip Stella (born May 12, 1936) is an American painter and printmaker.

He was born in Malden, Massachusetts.

He became influenced by the abstract expressionism of Jackson Pollock and Franz Kline. However, upon moving to New York City around the late 1950s, he reacted against the expressive use of paint by most painters of that movement, instead finding himself drawn towards the "flatter" surfaces of Barnett Newman's work and the "target" paintings of Jasper Johns.

He began to produce works which emphasized the picture-as-object, rather than the picture as a representation of something, be it something in the physical world, or something in the artist's emotional world.

This new aesthetic found expression in a series of paintings in which regular bands of black paint were separated by very thin white pinstripes of unpainted canvas. It takes its name ("The flag on high" in English) from the first line of the Horst-Wessel-Lied, the anthem of the National Socialist German Workers Party, and Stella pointed out that it is in the same proportions as banners used by that organization.

As well as their influence on other painters, these paintings were an important influence on the development of minimalist sculpture.

From 1960 he began to produce paintings in aluminum and copper paint which, in their presentation of regular lines of color separated by pinstripes, are similar to his black paintings.

Also in the 1960s, Stella began to use a wider range of colors, typically arranged in straight or curved lines. In 1967 he began his Protractor Series of paintings, in which arcs, sometimes overlapping, within square borders are arranged side-by-side to produce full and half circles painted in rings of concentric color.

Stella produced a series of prints during the late 1960's starting with a print called Quathlamba I in 1968.

In the 1970s Stella's style underwent a dramatic change. His work also became more three-dimensional to the point where he started producing large, free-standing metal pieces, which, although they are painted upon, might well be considered sculpture.

In 1993, Stella was commissioned to produce 10,000 sq. He has gone on to produce a number of large works for public spaces, and the three-dimensionality of his work has led to him being commissioned to produce architecture, including a bandshell for the city of Miami, Florida.

Stella continues to produce works in this style and lives in New York City.