Carl Holty

Known for his floating, luminous, highly-colorful forms, Carl Holty belongs to the school of pure geometric abstract artists, none more renowned than Piet Mondrian.

Holty, a native of Germany, came to the United States as an infant and grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He studied at the Art Institute of Chicago and the National Academy of Design in New York, and then went toMunich to enroll in the Hans Hofmann School, where he was exposed to Abstract Expressionism. Holty's early work also shows the influence of Fauvist colors and the work of French artists Maurice de Vlaminck and André Derain.

By the 1960s, Holty was creating paintings that were dominated by large color fields, rendered with thinly washed fluid areas within subtly toned spaces that revealed the influences of such abstract expressionist artists as Morris Louis and Helen Frankenthaler. A student of Hans Hofmann and his color theories of expanding dimensions and exuberant colors in abstractions, Holty essentially paved the way for the abstract expressionist movement and its following by the Color Field painters.

Throughout his life as an artist, Holty was constantly developing his vision of abstraction. Along with Hans Hofmann, Stuart Davis and Vaclav Vytlacil, Holty helped to found the organization known as the AmericanAbstract Artists. An icon in the annals of American contemporary art, Holty is best remembered for his use of color, shape and form.

Wisconsin Painters and Sculptors, Milwaukee Art Institute, Wisconsin, 1921-1926

Galerie de la Nouvelle Epoque, Paris, France, 1927

Solo exhibition, Simonson Galerie, Paris, France, 1928

Milwaukee Art Institute, Wisconsin, 1933 and 1935

J.B. Neumann, New Art Circle Gallery, New York, New York, 1936-1937

Nierdendorf Gallery, New York, New York, 1938-1943

World Fair, New York, New York, 1939-1940

Mortimer Brandt Gallery, New York, New York, 1944

Denver Art Museum, Colorado, 1944

Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio, 1944

San Francisco Art Museum, California, 1944

Abstract and Surrealist Art in America, Seattle Art Museum, Washington, 1944

J.B. Neumann, New Art Circle Gallery, New York, New York, 1944

Annual Exhibition of Contemporary Painting, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, 1945

Samuel Kootz Gallery, New York, New York, 1945-1948

Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 1946 and 1947

Annual Exhibition of Contemporary Painting, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, 1947

Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 1948

American Painting Today, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, New York, 1950

Abstract Painting and Sculpture in America, Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, 1951

J.B. Neumann, New Art Circle Gallery, New York, New York, 1952-1953

Graham Gallery, New York, New York, 1955-1956

Contemporary American Painting and Sculpture, Krannert Art Museum, University of Illinois, Urbana, 1963

Some Recent Gifts, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, New York, 1965

Annual Exhibition of American Painting, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, 1965

The 1930s Painting and Sculpture in America, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, 1968

Georgia State University, Atlanta, 1968

Birmingham Southern College, Alabama, 1968

Carl Holty: Recent Paintings, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, 1968

American Painting from the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Collection, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, New York, 1969

Carl Holty/Fifty Years: A Retrospective Exhibition, The Graduate Center Mall, The City University of New York, New York, 1972

Carl Holty Memorial Exhibition, Andrew Crispo Gallery, New York, New York, 1973

Carl Holty: The World Seen and Sensed, Milwaukee Art Museum, Wisconsin, 1980-81

Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas

Archer M Huntington Art Gallery, University of Texas, Austin

Brooklyn Museum, New York

Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio

Carnegie Institute Museum of Art, Pittsburgh

Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, Illinois

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, New York

Milwaukee Art Institute, Wisconsin

Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minnesota

Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York

Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.

Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, New York, New York

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York

Awards & Memberships

Selected Exhibitions

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