Joan Mitchell

Joan Mitchell (1926-1992), American painter, known for her work in the abstract expressionist style, which emphasized spontaneity and individuality. Her paintings, though abstract, often evoke a sense of landscape.

Mitchell was born in Chicago and studied at Smith College (1942-1944) and the Art Institute of Chicago (1944-1947). After studying painting in France with a one-year scholarship, she returned to the Art Institute, receiving a master's degree in 1950. In the early 1950s she studied briefly at Columbia University and New York University and made several visits to France, where she settled in the late 1950s. Mitchell's work was very popular during this time, but interest in her paintings waned in the 1960s as new art movements gained attention. During the 1970s, however, Mitchell's work enjoyed a resurgence that continued for the remainder of her career.

Mitchell was part of the so-called Second Generation of abstract expressionists—painters who refined and perfected the principles established by the originators of the abstract expressionism movement. She was especially influenced by painters such as Dutch-American Willem de Kooning, Armenian-American Arshile Gorky, and American Franz Kline.

Mitchell's works are characterized by white backgrounds that are as visually important as the subjects of the paintings. In addition, she often uses very large canvases. The representation of water is an important theme in many of her paintings, such as George Went Swimming at Barnes Hole, But It Got Too Cold (1957, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York). Major retrospective exhibitions of Mitchell's work have been held at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City (1974); the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C. (1988); and the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, in France (1982).