Good day Ellsworth Kelly! The mayors of three US cities – Austin, Chicago and New York – officially declared May 31 “Ellsworth Kelly Day” to commemorate what would have been the entertainer’s 100th birthday. To honor Kelly’s legacy, a year-long celebration of her seven-decade career is taking shape in several current and upcoming exhibitions in the United States and Europe.
The American painter, sculptor, photographer, draftsman and printmaker pioneered the abstract Color Field movement in the 1940s and 1950s and became known for his minimalist style, his distinctive use of color and geometric shapes and the incorporation of hard-edge paint. techniques. Born and raised in Newburgh, New York, Kelly lived and worked in the state until his death in December 2015 at the age of 92. For its centenary, a number of institutions including the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC); the Lever House in New York; the Edward Hopper House in Nyack; the Glenstone Museum in Potomac; and the Santa Barbara Museum of Art celebrate his lasting legacy with a number of special exhibitions and programs honoring Kelly’s most famous and lesser-known contributions to the art world.
Until March 17, 2024, the Glenstone Museum presents an encyclopedic exhibition entitled Ellsworth Kelly at 100, which brings together over 70 paintings, sculptures, works on paper and photographs, including Kelly’s large-scale floor panel installation “Yellow Curve” (1990). In May 2024, the show will travel to the Louis Vuitton Foundation in Paris and then to the Doha Fire Station in October 2024.
Earlier this month, the local community of Kelly in Columbia County also hosted several special events honoring the artist’s centennial, including a dedication at Austerlitz Town Hall; a screening of the documentary film by Ellsworth Kelly: Fragments (2007); a display of Kelly’s exhibition posters at Spencertown Academy; and an open house tour of the artist’s studio in Spencertown. In a exposure until June 11 at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in Manhattan, where Kelly held his first retrospective in 1973, visitors can see the paintings “Spectrum IV” (1967) and “Chatham VI” (1971) as well as “ Sculpture for a Large Wall” (1957), an in situ work designed by the artist for the Transportation Building in Philadelphia.
From July 1 to October 23, visitors can discover Kelly’s drawings at the AIC in Ellsworth Kelly: Portrait Drawings. The exhibition features 95 intimate portraits the artist drew of himself and his friends between 1994 and 2002, in addition to drawings made when he was 21 during his military service during World War II. The AIC is planning an additional installation of Kelly’s works, which were recently donated to the museum, and is expected to announce details soon.
Ellsworth Kelly’s centenary is also celebrated in several other exhibitions at the Fondazione Nicola Del Roscio in Rome, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Gemini GEL in New York and Los Angeles, the Peder Lund Gallery in Oslo, and the Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas at Austin. The latter is home to the famous Kelly’s”Austin(2015), an artist-designed 2,715 square foot stone structure whose facade is encrusted with rows of stained glass windows. A complete overview of the centenary exhibitions can be viewed on line.
