Helen Frankenthaler (1928–2011) was one of the most innovative and influential artists to emerge in the mid-twentieth century. Initially celebrated for her spontaneous and expressive Abstract Expressionist painting, she continuously developed her artistic approach throughout her lengthy career, experimenting with a variety of techniques and media.
In 1961, Frankenthaler made her first print and quickly took to the collaborative and technical challenge of printmaking. Over the next fifty years she became one of the most active and creative printmakers of her generation. Frankenthaler’s body of work stands out for the diversity of techniques she used, such as aquatint, lithography, woodcut, and screenprint, as well as the number of studios with which she partnered.
"We are delighted to present this celebration of Helen Frankenthaler's work. Her groundbreaking approach to printmaking deserves the careful focus provided by this exhibition. We are grateful to the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation for their generous gift, which provides IU students with a unique opportunity to study the work of a great American artist," said Mariah Keller, Interim Director of the Eskenazi Museum of Art.
Her work has been exhibited in major museums, including the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; the Detroit Institute of Arts, Michigan; and the Jewish Museum, New York.
Radius: Helen Frankenthaler Prints in Context celebrates the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation’s generous gift of fifteen prints, which in 2023 joined three other prints by the artist in the Eskenazi Museum of Art’s collection. Frankenthaler’s prints will be shown side-by-side with others by artists who had ties to the Abstract Expressionist movement, such as Lee Krasner, Robert Motherwell, and Jackson Pollock. The exhibition will be open Saturday, September 20, 2025, to Sunday, February 15, 2026.
This dialogue illuminates Frankenthaler’s connections with her contemporaries as well as her ingenuity and unique mastery of printmaking. The exhibition includes four proofs (test prints) and the final edition print of Radius (1993), evoking the circle of artists in Frankenthaler’s orbit and inspiring the title.
This exhibition offers students the opportunity to engage in creative research with original works from this highly collaborative era in printmaking. The exhibition is co-curated by Danielle Johnson, Director of Curatorial Affairs; Olivia Kalish, Graduate Assistant, Prints, Drawings, and Photographs; and Taylor Zartman, former Graduate Assistant, Prints, Drawings, and Photographs.
"It has been a pleasure to co-curate Radius: Helen Frankenthaler Prints in Context. While looking at this sample of works over a large period of her career and researching her practice, I noticed Frankenthaler's evolving concerns in printmaking. She constantly engaged in a dialogue with her collaborators, various printing techniques, and her compositions until she arrived at a final image. Though you can see how the work grows, you also notice themes and motifs that remained important sites of visual engagement across this body of work," commented Olivia Kalish, Graduate Assistant, Prints, Drawings, and Photographs.
The Eskenazi Museum of Art is a 2023 recipient of the Frankenthaler Prints Initiative, an ongoing program for university-affiliated art museums that reflects the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation’s commitment to supporting undergraduate and graduate education in the visual arts and art history. The awardees include two cohorts comprising ten museums from across the country, each of which received a group of prints and five to ten related trial proofs drawn from the Foundation’s extensive collection of work by Frankenthaler. The museums also receive a one-time grant of $25,000 to develop a project or program for the study, presentation, and interpretation of the editions and proofs.
This exhibition is made possible through the generosity of the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation and Del and Letty Newkirk.
