NARRATOR:
This painting, called Hiraqla Variation III, is part of a group of works artist Frank Stella called the “Protractor Series,” after the semicircular instrument used in drafting to calculate and measure angles. He conceived the series, which was never completed, as 31 large-scale paintings titled after the ancient circular cities of Asia Minor. Hiraqla, now an archeological site, is in present-day Syria.
Bold colors and geometric forms divide the ovoid canvas, with semi-circular fans framing a central square panel. The arrangement brings to mind a kaleidoscope, its fluorescent colors and elongated diamond shapes arranged around a central cross.
Large scale abstract paintings were not unusual in the 1960s, but breaking free of the traditional rectangular shape of a canvas was something new. Each of the "Protractor Series" paintings has a curved shape that reinforces the design scheme and gives the works an almost architectural quality.
Stella has spent his adult life in New York, and is usually associated with the art scene in that city. But from the early 1960s Stella has also had ties to the west coast. Two major gallery shows were held in Los Angeles in 1963 and 1965, and in 1966 Stella’s first solo museum exhibition was at the former Pasadena Art Museum—now the Norton Simon Museum.
Hiraqla Variation III
1969
Frank Stella (American, 1936–)
Not on View
In 1967, Stella began working on his famed "Protractor Series," in which thirty-one canvas formats are realized in three different designs: interlaces, rainbows, and fans. "Hiraqla Variation III" is an example of the fan design. Here, semi-circles are filled with rhythmic wedges of color. To balance the decorative patterns created in these paintings, Stella used a wide and graduated range of colors, many of which he mixed himself. Stella named the paintings in this series after ancient circular Islamic cities and the gateways that surrounded them.
Details
- Artist Name: Frank Stella (American, 1936–)
- Title: Hiraqla Variation III
- Date: 1969
- Medium: Fluorescent acrylic on oval canvas
- Dimensions: 120 x 240 x 3-1/16 in. (304.8 x 609.6 x 7.8 cm)
- Credit Line: Norton Simon Museum, Gift of the Artist
- Accession Number: P.1969.127
- Copyright: © 2017 Frank Stella / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Reproduction, including downloading of ARS works is prohibited by copyright laws and international conventions without the express written permission of Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Object Information
Frank Stella, gift 1969 to;
Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena, 1969-1975;
Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, 1975.
Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena, 1969-1975;
Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, 1975.
The Chromatic Eye: New York Paintings and Prints from the 1960s
- Norton Simon Museum, 2001-07-20 to 2001-10-22
- Pasadena Art Museum, Recent Acquisitions 1969, p. 13
- Armory Center for the Arts/Art Center College of Design, Radical Past: Contemporary Art & Music in Pasadena, 1960-1974, p. 91
- Norton Simon Museum Members' Summer Newsletter,
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