ELLSWORTH KELLY (1923-2015)
Red White
inscribed '#392 B' (on the stretcher)
oil on canvas, on two joined panels
100 x 100 in (254 x 254 cm)
Painted in 1968
Footnotes:
Provenance
Sidney Janis Gallery, New York.
Dayton's Gallery 12, Minneapolis.
Lewis Kaplan Collection, London.
Locksley Shea Gallery, Minneapolis, no. #2065.
John M. and Marion A. Shea Collection, Palm Springs.
Gordon Locksley and George T. Shea Collection, Palm Springs (by descent from the above).
Acquired from the above by the present owner.

Exhibited
Newport Beach, Newport Harbor Art Museum, Our Own Art, March-May 1979.

Literature
J. Coplans, Ellsworth Kelly, New York, 1971, n. 192 (illustrated).


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Ellsworth Kelly's canvases offer some of the most complex and jarring propositions on the nature of perception and abstraction. Red White from 1968, is one of the most compelling examples by this grand master of Modernism; a shaped, two-panel canvas that has all the qualities of his finest paintings, formerly in the collection of Gordon Locksley and George Shea. Kelly's paintings are monolithic and powerful, they impress upon us the majesty of scale and form. In bowing arcs and razor-sharp edges, visual melodies emerge that vibrate with an elegant simplicity as colors abut and shapes compete. Their size and directness, however, obfuscate how they relate to observation and still life. As pictures, Kelly's canvases translate as shadows projected on walls, corners of studios at dusk, horizon lines, architectural silhouettes. To speak of them as pure abstraction is only one angle to Kelly's expansive vision of painting. In the crisp, pointed edges of Red White, we glimpse a masterpiece of Minimalism and Hard-edge painting. It is a visual chord that resounds in its space, the sharp and flat notes of the colors struck in a single forceful shape. Profound and graceful, Red White is surely one of Kelly's great multi-panel shaped canvases, formerly in the Locksley Shea collection, that reaffirms the beauty of simplicity – an inspiration that Kelly was able to see everywhere, and that connected him so eloquently to the lived experience and to the experience of art.

Kelly's work in the 1960s marked a significant period in his artistic evolution. His exploration of Hard-edge painting and departure from traditionally shaped canvases represented an innovation in his approach to abstraction. Characterized by sharp, defined edges between colors and shapes, Hard-edge painting emerged in the 1950s and was primarily associated with Op art and Geometric Abstraction. A leading figure in this movement, Kelly paved the way alongside artists such as Frank Stella and Kenneth Noland and drew inspiration from the earlier work of Piet Mondrian and Josef Albers.

The present work was created at the height of the artist's experimentation with color and shape. His use of precise, clearly delineated shapes and color lacking visible brushstrokes or blending creates a clean and crisp aesthetic that focuses on the interaction of geometric forms and the viewer's perception. By carefully arranging the geometric canvases, he created a work which explores themes of color theory, spatial relationships and the visual effects of contrasting colors and shapes. Reducing forms to their essential elements and eliminating unnecessary details enabled Kelly to focus on pure abstraction.

Kelly's shaped canvases were not simply focused on the outer form but also the interplay between positive and negative space within the work. They were not standalone objects but were intended to interact with the wall and surrounding environment, often echoing architectural elements or responding to spatial considerations. His fascination with architecture was an important aspect of his practice and source of creative inspiration, making him keenly aware of space and how light played on surfaces. Kelly went on to create site specific and installation work in his later career; the last work of art he created in 2015 being the only building he ever designed, Austin.

Drawn to the simplicity and clarity of primary colors, Kelly believed that they had an inherent power and purity that could evoke a strong emotional and visual response. As evidenced in Red White, his use of the color red contrasting against crisp cool white elicits a powerful visual impact. Red is a color often associated with strong emotions like passion, energy and vitality and the symbolic associations add layers of meaning to his composition, inviting the view to interpret and engage with his work on multiple levels.

Kelly studied at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn in the early 1940s before serving in the army during World War II. After the war, he studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and later at École des Beaux-Arts under his GI bill. Kelly's time in Paris had a profound impact on his artistic development as he drew influence from artists like Jean-Arp, Constantin Brâncuși and Henri Matisse while also experimenting with geometric forms. In the mid-1950s, Kelly moved back to New York City where he became associated with the Abstract Expressionist movement, soon developing his distinct style. He was drawn to simple shapes, bold colors and clean lines, distancing and differentiating himself from the emotional intensity of his peers. By the 1960s, Kelly's mature style had emerged as he focused on geometry and flat, intense color, with an emphasis on the interaction between shapes, colors, and space.

With an incredibly rich exhibition history dating back to Sidney Janis in its year of execution, Kelly's Red White comes to market now one of the best shaped canvases of the 1960s to be available publicly. The work has a robust history of public view, including an early exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, New York in 1968, honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The works in the exhibition were donated by the artists themselves and were sold to benefit the civil rights organization, Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Around sixty of America's most influential artists participated in the exhibition, including Alexander Calder, Donald Judd, Robert Motherwell, Kenneth Noland, Mark Rothko, Frank Stella, Andy Warhol and more. Red White went on to be featured in many shows and exhibitions across the United States including a group show alongside Kenneth Noland, Frank Stella and Morris Lewis at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago in 1970 and eventually back home, to the Minneapolis Institute of the Arts in Minneapolis where it has remained on loan since 2006.

The present work comes from the collection of notable Minneapolis art patrons Gordon Locksley and George T. Shea, who in the 1960s opened Locksley Shea Gallery out of their home. Locksley was a highly exclusive hair stylist when he met Shea, who was a professor of Japanese language and literature at the University of Minnesota. Together they opened Red Carpet Beauty Salon and school, dealing art out the salon and eventually moving the gallery into their mansion. The gallery became a leading venue to exhibit Contemporary art in Minneapolis during the 1960s and 1970s, attracting some the most iconic artists of the generation including Ellsworth Kelly, Roy Lichtenstein, Donald Judd, Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg and Claes Oldenburg, among many others. Known for their legendary and lavish parties with live bands and gogo dancers, Locksley Shea Gallery attracted a myriad of clientele and widely diverse group of influential figures in the local and international arts community.