Al Held

Al Held was born to Polish immigrants in Brooklyn 1928. He grew up in New York and at the age of seventeen he joined the U.S. Navy. A few years later, after finishing his Navy service, Held became interested in visual art. He decided to take classes at the Art Students League using a stipend from the GI Bill, then moved to Paris to study at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. Held emerged as an artist in 1950s New York at a time when the gesture and drip of Abstract Expressionism was the dominant art form. Instead of following the trend, Held explored the core vocabulary of drawing and painting— sharp geometry, graphic lines, and a mostly primary color palette—to create new and infinite spatial relationships. His work has been featured in museums worldwide, including the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin, the Guggenheim in New York, and the Tate Gallery in London. Held passed away in his home in Italy in 2005. (From Paths and Edges exhibition, Guggenheim Gallery, August 2015)