Palazzo Strozzi in Florence presents until 26 January 2025 “Helen Frankenthaler: Painting without rules”the largest exhibition ever held in Italy, dedicated to one of the most important American artists of the twentieth century. Along with a wide selection of works created between 1953 and 2002, thirty large canvases and sculptures by Frankenthaler, from the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation and on loan from
important museums and private collections, the exhibition will allow us to discover the artist’s connections, influences and friendships. THEFrankenthaler’s works are in fact compared with the works of contemporary artists, some from her personal collection, such as Anthony Caro, Morris Louis, Robert Motherwell, Kenneth Noland, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, David Smith, Anne Truitt.
Key figure in the second generation of post-war American abstract painters, Frankenthaler (1928-2011) played a fundamental role in the transition from Abstract Expressionism to the so-called Color Field Painting. In over sixty years of career Frankenthaler has established herself on the American art scene through one approach “without rules”challenging the limits of painting techniques but also the genre expectations of the time, establishing herself as one of the leading artists of her generation. Thanks to his eclectic imagination and improvisational skills he explored a new relationship between color and form, expanding the possibilities of abstract painting in a way that still inspires generations of artists today. Color and space, abstraction and poetry: the art of 
Frankenthaler stands out for a unique ability to combine technique and imagination, research and improvisation, going beyond canons, rules and conventions in search of a new freedom in painting.
Arturo Galansino, General Director of the Palazzo Strozzi Foundation, states: “We are thrilled to present the work of Helen Frankenthaler in an unprecedented major exhibition in Italy, allowing the public to discover a seminal artist of the 20th century. With the s
With her innovative and counter-current approach, Frankenthaler has distinguished herself as a pioneering figure in the field of abstract painting, expanding its potential in a way that continues to inspire new generations of artists today“.
Organized chronologically, the exhibition traces the development of Frankenthaler’s creative practice with each room dedicated to a decade of his output from the 1950s to the 1990s. Her artistic innovations, combined with paintings, sculptures and works on paper by contemporary artists, will highlight the synergies and affinities between these authors. The exhibition thus showcases Jackson Pollock’s consolidated influence on Frankenthaler in the 1950s, with Number 14 (1951), a black and white painting compared to Frankenthaler’s Mediterranean Thoughts (1960), a colorful oil work that 
features similar “elements of abstract realism or Surrealism,” a phrase Frankenthaler used to describe Pollock’s work after seeing it in person for the first time. Tutti-Frutti (1966), a “soak-stain” painting of floating colored clouds, finds a three-dimensional analogue in Untitled (1964), a painted steel sculpture by David Smith, composed of geometric shapes stacked on top of each other, resting on four small wheels. Heart of London Map (1972), a steel assemblage, instead compares itself with Ascending the Stairs by Anthony Caro (1979-1983), in its piece-by-piece construction.
Throughout the exhibition, the works from the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s are the testimony of an artist who has never stopped breaking the
rules for exploring new ways of making art. The exhibition will be enriched by educational projects and apparatus that will allow visitors to learn about and delve deeper into Frankenthaler’s life and artistic practice also through archival documents, photographs and correspondence with friends.
Helen Frankenthaler. Born in New York, Helen Frankenthaler (1928-2011) completed her artistic studies with Paul Feeley at Bennington College, before returning to Manhattan, where she approached abstract art. At the beginning of the 1950s he came into contact with the exponents of the New York School and key figures of post-war American art, developing friendships and working relationships. Frankenthaler soon found herself surrounded by artists who shared her strong commitment to experimentation. Some became friends with whom he shared studio visits, intense correspondence and exchanges of opinions, as well as collecting their works, which he exhibited in his home in Manhattan. Among these, some will be the protagonists of the exhibition at Palazzo Strozzi such as the work on paper Helen’s Collage (1957) by Robert Motherwell, Aleph Series V (1960), painting by Morris Louis, or the sculpture Ascending the Stairs (1979-1983) by Anthony Dear.
The exhibition is co-organized by Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi, Florence, and Helen Frankenthaler Foundation, New York, and is curated by Douglas Dreishpoon, Director, Helen Frankenthaler Catalog Raisonné.
Carlo Franza