Ellsworth Kelly was an eminent American artist known for his abstract paintings. His use of bright colors, and simple shapes, contributed to the discourse of 20th-century painting. “I have worked to free shape from its ground, and then to work the shape so that it has a definite relationship to the space around it,” he once explained. “So that it has a clarity and a measure within itself of its parts (angles, curves, edges and mass); and so that, with color and tonality, the shape finds its own space and always demands its freedom and separateness.” Born on May 31, 1923 in Newburgh, NY, he went on to study technical drawing and design at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. In 1943, he joined the army and worked as ...