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Helen Frankenthaler

Sea Change: A Decade of Paintings, 1974–1983

March 13–July 19, 2019
Rome

Installation view with Helen Frankenthaler, Tunis II (1978) Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Installation view with Helen Frankenthaler, Tunis II (1978)

Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Installation view Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Installation view

Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Installation view Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Installation view

Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Installation view Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Installation view

Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Works Exhibited

Helen Frankenthaler, Shippan Point: Twilight, 1980 Acrylic on canvas, 71 × 55 inches (180.3 × 139.7 cm)© 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Helen Frankenthaler, Shippan Point: Twilight, 1980

Acrylic on canvas, 71 × 55 inches (180.3 × 139.7 cm)
© 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Helen Frankenthaler, Jupiter, 1976 Acrylic on canvas, 106 × 74 ¼ inches (269.2 × 188.6 cm)© 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Helen Frankenthaler, Jupiter, 1976

Acrylic on canvas, 106 × 74 ¼ inches (269.2 × 188.6 cm)
© 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

About

Draw in and on the entire surface of it, color it in part, and make it a kind of sea.
—Helen Frankenthaler

Gagosian is pleased to present an exhibition of paintings by Helen Frankenthaler in Rome, coinciding with an exhibition of her work at the Museo di Palazzo Grimani, Venice, on the occasion of the 58th Venice Biennale.

In the summer of 1974, Frankenthaler rented a house at Shippan Point in Stamford, Connecticut, facing the waters of Long Island Sound, marking the beginning of an important period of change for her work. Sea Change comprises eleven canvases that Frankenthaler painted between 1974 and 1983, which reflect her responses to the changing appearance of the wide vistas and moving tides.

One of the earliest canvases, Ocean Drive West #1 (1974), is explicitly oceanic with its floating horizontal bands, seeming to recede across an expanse of transparent blue. In Jupiter (1976) and Reflection (1977), the bands are clustered together and turned to the vertical, appearing to all but dissolve. In both of these paintings, the warm earth colors of the bands contrast with a cool, aqueous blue-green, evoking the meeting of land and water. The large, wide canvases, Tunis II and Dream Walk Red (both 1978), emanate warmth, with densely layered dark red, rose, crimson, sienna, and scarlet. In this period, Frankenthaler talked about “doing more to each picture,” to create something at once more complex and complete.

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Disegna sull’intera superficie ed al suo interno, colorane alcune parti e trasformala in una specie di mare.
—Helen Frankenthaler

Gagosian è lieta di presentare a Roma una mostra di dipinti di Helen Frankenthaler, in concomitanza con l’esposizione dell’artista al Museo di Palazzo Grimani durante la Biennale di Venezia 2019.

Frankenthaler è da tempo riconosciuta come una delle più grandi artiste americane del Ventesimo secolo. Figura di punta della seconda generazione di pittori astratti americani del Dopoguerra, è famosa per il suo ruolo fondamentale nella transizione dall’Espressionismo Astratto al movimento Color Field. Con la sua invenzione della tecnica soak-stain, ha ampliato le possibilità della pittura astratta, rifacendosi a volte anche al figurativo e al paesaggio in modo unico.

Nell’estate del 1974 Frankenthaler affitta una casa a Shippan Point vicino a Stamford, nel Connecticut, affacciata sulle acque del Long Island Sound, segnando l’inizio di un importante periodo di cambiamento nel suo lavoro. La mostra, intitolata Sea Change, comprende undici tele dipinte tra il 1974 e il 1983 fortemente influenzate dagli ampi panorami e dal movimento delle maree di questi nuovi paesaggi.

Una delle prime tele di quegli anni, Ocean Drive West #1 (1974), si riferisce esplicitamente all’oceano con le sue bande orizzontali fluttuanti, che sembrano arretrare di fronte a una distesa blu trasparente. In Jupiter (1976) e Reflection (1977), le pennellate sono dense e verticali, e sembrano essere sul punto di dissolversi. In entrambi questi dipinti, i colori caldi della terra sono in contrasto con il blu-verde acqueo, evocando l’incontro tra terra e acqua. Le tele di grande formato Tunis II e Dream Walk Red (entrambe del 1978), esprimono un forte senso di calore, con densi strati di rosso scuro, rosa, cremisi, terra di Siena e rosso scarlatto. In questo periodo Frankenthaler lavora sul concetto di “fare di più per ogni immagine,” per creare opere allo stesso tempo più complesse e complete.

In Feather (1979), Omen (1980) e Shippan Point: Twilight (1980) i colori si mescolano, si sovrappongono e si ripiegano l’uno nell’altro producendo sfumature morbide ed originali. I tocchi, i segni e i tratti di pigmento giallo di Omen preannunciano le successive tele orizzontali di dimensioni ambiziose: densi grumi e tracce di colore scuro su un fondo più chiaro in Sacrifice Decision (1981), o di colore chiaro su un fondo più scuro in Eastern Light (1982). Con Tumbleweed (1982), Frankenthaler inquadra questo approccio pittorico su un campo verde luminoso e compatto, allontanandolo dal riferimento ai valori atmosferici – di aria e acqua – per portarlo su un terreno più solido, come espresso dal titolo e dalla superficie verdeggiante. Questa tela, la più recente in mostra, testimonia il momento in cui Frankenthaler inizia a non pensare più all’acqua e immagina invece di spostarsi su una superficie piatta e resistente. Il solido sfondo verde è al contempo l’opposto e il risultato del processo iniziato con il fluido monocromo blu di Ocean Drive West #1. Una “specie di mare” torna sulla terraferma.

Helen Frankenthaler: Sea Change, quinta mostra di Frankenthaler presentata alla Gagosian dal 2013, è curata da John Elderfield, curatore senior presso Gagosian. La mostra sarà accompagnata da un catalogo illustrato con un saggio di Elderfield.

Pittura/Panorama: Paintings by Helen Frankenthaler, 1952–1992 a Palazzo Grimani, Venezia, sarà visitabile fino al 17 novembre.

Carol Armstrong and John Elderfield seated in front of a painting by Helen Frankenthaler

In Conversation
Carol Armstrong and John Elderfield

In conjunction with the exhibition Drawing within Nature: Paintings from the 1990s at Gagosian in New York, Carol Armstrong and John Elderfield discuss Helen Frankenthaler’s paintings and large-scale works on paper dating from 1990 to 1995.

Helen Frankenthaler, Madame Butterfly, 102 color woodcut from 46 woodblocks

The Romance of a New Medium: Helen Frankenthaler and the Art of Collaboration

Inspired by the recent retrospective of Helen Frankenthaler’s woodcuts at the Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, William Davie writes about the artist’s innovative journey with printmaking. Davie illuminates Frankenthaler’s formative collaborations with master printers Tatyana Grosman and Kenneth Tyler.

Katy Hessel, Matthew Holman, and Eleanor Nairne

In Conversation
Katy Hessel, Matthew Holman, and Eleanor Nairne on Helen Frankenthaler

Broadcaster and art historian Katy Hessel; Matthew Holman, associate lecturer in English at University College London; and Eleanor Nairne, curator at the Barbican Art Gallery, London, discuss Helen Frankenthaler’s early training, the development of her signature soak-stain technique and subsequent shifts in style, and her connections to the London art world.

Helen Frankenthaler, Heart of London Map, steel sculpture

Helen Frankenthaler: A Painter’s Sculptures

On the occasion of four exhibitions in London exploring different aspects of Helen Frankenthaler’s work, Lauren Mahony introduces texts by the sculptor Anthony Caro and by the artist herself on her relatively unfamiliar first body of sculpture, made in the summer of 1972 in Caro’s London studio.

Carrie Mae Weems’s The Louvre (2006), on the cover of Gagosian Quarterly, Summer 2021

Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Summer 2021

The Summer 2021 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring Carrie Mae Weems’s The Louvre (2006) on its cover.

Augurs of Spring

Augurs of Spring

As spring approaches in the Northern Hemisphere, Sydney Stutterheim reflects on the iconography and symbolism of the season in art both past and present.

News

Helen Frankenthaler, Distant Barrier, 1992 © 2020 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Art Fair

Art Basel Miami Beach Online

Gagosian Online
November 29–December 7, 2020
Presented in four forty-eight-hour cycles
gagosian.com

OVR: Miami Beach 
VIP preview: December 2–4, 2020
Public viewing: December 4–6, 2020
artbasel.com

On the occasion of Art Basel Miami Beach 2020, which was canceled this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Gagosian is pleased to present works by modern and contemporary masters on two concurrent online platforms: Gagosian Online, which will feature four individually curated groupings of artworks in forty-eight-hour cycles, and OVR: Miami Beach.

Helen Frankenthaler, Distant Barrier, 1992 © 2020 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Helen Frankenthaler in her studio at East 83rd Street and Third Avenue, New York, 1969. Photo: Ernst Haas/Masters/Getty Images

In Conversation

John Elderfield
Clifford Ross

Wednesday, May 15, 2019, 6pm
Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Rome
lagallerianazionale.com

On the occasion of Helen Frankenthaler’s first exhibition of paintings in Rome, and first exhibition in Venice since 1966, when she, along with Ellsworth Kelly, Roy Lichtenstein, and Jules Olitski, represented the United States in the 33rd Venice Biennale, curator John Elderfield and artist Clifford Ross will discuss her work and legacy. The talk will be moderated by art historian and curator Flavia Frigeri. The event is free and open to the public.

Helen Frankenthaler in her studio at East 83rd Street and Third Avenue, New York, 1969. Photo: Ernst Haas/Masters/Getty Images

Installation view, Helen Frankenthaler: Sea Change: A Decade of Paintings, 1974–1983, Gagosian, Rome, March 13–July 19, 2019. Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio

Tour

Helen Frankenthaler
Sea Change: A Decade of Paintings, 1974–1983

Tuesday, May 14, 2019, 6pm
Gagosian, Rome

Gagosian senior curator John Elderfield and director Jason Ysenburg will lead a tour of the exhibition Helen Frankenthaler: Sea Change: A Decade of Paintings, 1974–1983 at Gagosian, Rome. Elderfield and Ysenburg will explore the important period in Helen Frankenthaler’s work that began in the summer of 1974, which was sparked by the changing appearance of the wide vistas and moving tides of the Long Island Sound. The show coincides with an exhibition of her work at the Museo di Palazzo Grimani in Venice on the occasion of the 58th Venice Biennale. To attend the free event, RSVP to rometours@gagosian.com. Space is limited.

Installation view, Helen Frankenthaler: Sea Change: A Decade of Paintings, 1974–1983, Gagosian, Rome, March 13–July 19, 2019. Artwork © 2019 Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, Inc./Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Matteo D’Eletto, M3 Studio