HELEN FRANKENTHALER

Helen Frankenthaler is one of America’s most influential, yet often under-recognized, artists of the 20th century. A leading force in the development of Color Field painting, Frankenthaler was an innovator. She developed new applications of color and shapes that extend across the entire painting, left areas of her canvases unpainted, mastered her soak stain technique, and was one of the first artists to paint on monumental canvases. Frankenthaler’s early exposure to Abstract Expressionist painting and her close proximity to its inner circle of artists came through her friendship with legendary art critic Clement Greenberg, providing a solid foundation for the young artist to develop her own distinctive style. 

Both inspired by—and in response to—approaches like Jackson Pollock’s quickly executed, rapid drip method of applying paint, Frankenthaler developed a slower action-painting style. She developed her signature soak stain process by drenching thinned paint across the canvas gradually and evenly. Frankenthaler’s shapes and designs first took form in her mind, yet she allowed the paint to flow spontaneously around the canvas as well. This process, more of a call-and-response than a one-way conversation of forcefully splattered paint on canvas, gave Frankenthaler’s paintings agency in their creation. As she slowly soaked paint onto the linen canvas, the linen fibers could respond by absorbing colors deeply within their weave, even extending the paint beyond the original surface Frankenthaler painted. 

In Cravat, Frankenthaler reintroduces the sparing use of line in her painting, found in her very early work, pairing it with her brilliant command of color and shape. Often using memories of landscapes as sources of inspiration, the painting exudes a sense of place, where green foliage or mountains are surrounded and tied together by earthen colors below and a purple radiant sky above. 

Helen Frankenthaler in her studio, 1967 | From the Vaults 

The Met