Agnes Martin

Agnes Martin (b. 1912, Macklin, Canada) was one of the most influential painters of her generation and left an enduring mark on the history of modern and contemporary art. Interested in the transcendent potential of painting, Martin was a contemporary of the Abstract Expressionists and identified her work with the movement. Nonetheless, her oeuvre played a critical role in heralding the advent of Minimalism.

Martin spent her early childhood years in Saskatchewan, on the western plains of Canada, an experience that would influence her throughout her life. As a young adult, she moved to the United States, first to Bellingham, Washington (1931) then to New York (1941), and finally to Albuquerque, where she studied painting at the University of New Mexico (1946–48). She returned to New York in 1951 where, while earning a master’s degree at the Teachers College at Columbia University, she became engaged with Buddhist thought through lectures by Jiddu Krishnamurti and Zen scholar D.T. Suzuki. Her interest in Eastern philosophy developed in parallel with her appreciation of Abstract Expressionism, resulting in paintings characterized by biomorphic forms and geometric abstraction, further distilled in an earthy palette of beiges, greens, grays, and creams. Characterized by austere lines and grids superimposed upon grounds of muted color, Martin’s paintings elegantly negotiate the confines of structure, space, draftsmanship, and the metaphysical.