Ellsworth Kelly
American, 1923–2015
One of the most acclaimed American artists, Kelly was born in Newburgh, New York, and had a long and prolific career. He completed many public commissions, including work for the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., in 1993; panels for the John Joseph Moakley United States Courthouse in Boston in 1998; a sculpture for The Art Institute of Chicago in 2009; and a sculpture for The Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia in 2012. The artist was awarded the 2012 National Medal of Arts. In January 2015 Kelly gifted the Blanton Museum of Art at The University of Texas at Austin the design concept for his most monumental work, a 2,715-square-foot stone building with luminous colored glass windows, a totemic wood sculpture, and 14 black-and-white stone panels in marble, entitled Austin.
“The most pleasurable thing in the world, for me, is to see something and then translate how I see it.”
