Color field painting, which emerged in the United States in the 1950s, is characterized by pouring, staining, or spraying thinned paint onto raw canvas, creating vast chromatic expanses. Exemplified in the work of Helen Frankenthaler, Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland, Jules Olitski, Larry Poons, and Frank Stella, these paintings constitute one of the crowning achievements of postwar American abstract art. Surprisingly, there has not been a major exhibition or book to date that has examined the color field artists as a group or color field painting—its sources, meaning, and impact. Color as Field, encompassing approximately forty-one large-scale canvases, presents a remarkable opportunity for viewers to fully comprehend the aims of these artists, view their finest works in close relation to each other, and experience the beauty and visual magnetism of their pictorial handling of space and color.

Guest Curator Karen Wilkin is a specialist in twentieth century modernism and has published widely on this period. The exhibition catalogue, published by the AFA and Yale University Press, features essays by Wilkin and Carl Belz, Director Emeritus of the Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, on the color field artists as a group and as individual painters, and on such issues as the history of color in art.

Exhibition itinerary: Denver Art Museum (November 9, 2007–February 3, 2008); Smithsonian American Art Museum (February 29–May 26, 2008); Frist Center for the Visual Arts (June 20 –September 21, 2008).

For more information contact Curator of Exhibitions Lisa Small at 212.988.7700 ext. 225 or lsmall@afaweb.org. You may also contact Theo Walther, Curatorial Assistant, at 212.988.7700 ext. 216 or twalther@afaweb.org.