Brice Marden
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Nicholas Brice Marden Jr. (October 15, 1938 – August 9, 2023) was an American artist generally described as
minimalist In visual arts, music, and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in the post-war era in western art. The movement is often interpreted as a reaction to abstract expressionism and modernism; it anticipated contemporary post-mi ...
, although his work has roots in
abstract expressionism Abstract expressionism in the United States emerged as a distinct art movement in the aftermath of World War II and gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s, a shift from the American social realism of the 1930s influenced by the Great Depressi ...
, color field painting. and
lyrical abstraction Lyrical abstraction arose from either of two related but distinct art movement, trends in Post-war Modernist painting: * European ''Abstraction Lyrique'': a movement that emerged in Paris, with the French art critic Jean José Marchand being cr ...
. He lived and worked in
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
;
Tivoli, New York Tivoli is a village (New York), village in Dutchess County, New York, Dutchess County, New York (state), New York, United States. The population is 1,012, according to the 2020 census. The village, which was incorporated in 1872 from parts of Upp ...
; Hydra, Greece; and Eagles Mere, Pennsylvania.


Early life

Nicholas Brice Marden Jr. was born in
Bronxville, New York Bronxville is a Administrative divisions of New York#Village, village in Westchester County, New York, Westchester County, New York (state), New York, United States, located approximately north of Midtown Manhattan. It is part of the Adminis ...
, and grew up in nearby Briarcliff Manor. He attended
Florida Southern College Florida Southern College (Florida Southern, Southern or FSC) is a private college in Lakeland, Florida. In 2019, the student population at FSC consisted of 3,073 students along with 130 full-time faculty members. It offers undergraduate, gradua ...
from 1957 to 1958 before receiving his B.F.A. from the
Boston University Boston University (BU) is a Private university, private research university in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. BU was founded in 1839 by a group of Boston Methodism, Methodists with its original campus in Newbury (town), Vermont, Newbur ...
School of Fine and Applied Arts in 1961. Thereafter, Marden earned his M.F.A. from the
Yale School of Art The Yale School of Art is the art school of Yale University. Founded in 1869 as the first professional fine arts school in the United States, it grants Master of Fine Arts, Masters of Fine Arts degrees to students completing a two-year course in g ...
in 1963, where he studied with Esteban Vicente,
Alex Katz Alex Katz (born July 24, 1927) is an American figurative artist known for his paintings, sculptures, and printmaking, prints. Since 1951, Katz's work has been the subject of more than 200 solo exhibitions and nearly 500 group exhibitions through ...
, Jon Schueler,
Jack Tworkov Jack Tworkov (15 August 1900 – 4 September 1982) was an American abstract expressionist painter. Early life and education Yakov Tworkovsky, was born in BiaÅ‚a Podlaska on the border between Poland and the Russian Empire. His father was a t ...
, Reginald Pollack, Philip Pearlstein, and Gabor Peterdi. Among his fellow students were the future artists
Richard Serra Richard Serra (November 2, 1938 – March 26, 2024) was an American artist known for his large-scale Abstract art, abstract sculptures made for Site-specific art, site-specific landscape, urban, and Architecture, architectural settings, a ...
,
Chuck Close Charles Thomas Close (July 5, 1940 – August 19, 2021) was an American painter, visual artist, and photographer who made massive-scale photorealism, photorealist and abstract portraits of himself and others. Close also created photo portraits ...
, Janet Fish, Vija Celmins,
Nancy Graves Nancy Graves (December 23, 1939 – October 21, 1995) was an American sculptor, painter, printmaker, and sometime filmmaker known for her focus on natural phenomena like camels or maps of the Moon. Her works are included in many public collection ...
, Gary Hudson, and Sylvia and Robert Mangold. As he studied art, Marden was also immersed in the
Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...
-based
American folk music revival The American folk music revival began during the 1940s and peaked in popularity in the mid-1960s. Early folk music performers include Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Pete Seeger, Ewan MacColl (UK), Richard Dyer-Bennet, Oscar Brand, Jean Ritchie ...
scene. His first wife, Pauline Baez, whom he married in 1960, was
Joan Baez Joan Chandos Baez (, ; born January 9, 1941) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and activist. Her contemporary folk music often includes songs of protest and social justice. Baez has performed publicly for over 60 years, releasing mo ...
's sister. He met
Bob Dylan Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan; born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Described as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture over his nearly 70-year ...
and
Pete Seeger Peter Seeger (May 3, 1919 â€“ January 27, 2014) was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and social activist. He was a fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s and had a string of hit records in the early 1950s as a member of The Weav ...
and lived for a while at Joan Baez's house in
Carmel, California Carmel-by-the-Sea (), commonly known simply as Carmel, is a city in Monterey County, California, located on the Central Coast of California. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the city had a population of 3,220, down from 3,722 a ...
.Barbara Isenberg (October 15, 2006)
For Marden, seeing is creating
''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...
''.
It was at
Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...
that Marden developed the formal strategies that would characterize his drawings and paintings in the proceeding decades: a preoccupation with rectangular formats, and the repeated use of a muted palette. In his early work of the 1960s and 1970s, he used simplified means, typically
monochrome A monochrome or monochromatic image, object or palette is composed of one color (or values of one color). Images using only shades of grey are called grayscale (typically digital) or black-and-white (typically analog). In physics, mon ...
canvases either alone or in series of panels,
diptych A diptych (, ) is any object with two flat plates which form a pair, often attached by a hinge. For example, the standard notebook and school exercise book of the ancient world was a diptych consisting of a pair of such plates that contained a ...
s or
triptych A triptych ( ) is a work of art (usually a panel painting) that is divided into three sections, or three carved panels that are hinged together and can be folded shut or displayed open. It is therefore a type of polyptych, the term for all m ...
s. These include the works ''The Dylan Painting,'' 1966; "1986" (now in the collection of
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern art, modern and contemporary art museum and nonprofit organization located in San Francisco, California. SFMOMA was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th-century art ...
); 1969's ''Fave'' (the Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art,
University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...
); and ''Lethykos (for Tonto)'', 1976 (
The Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, and includes over 200,000 works of arc ...
, New York).


Career


Early work

Marden relocated to
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
in 1963, where he came into contact with the work of
Jasper Johns Jasper Johns (born May 15, 1930) is an American painter, sculptor, draftsman, and printmaker. Considered a central figure in the development of American postwar art, he has been variously associated with abstract expressionism, Neo-Dada, and ...
while employed as a guard at the
Jewish Museum A Jewish museum is a museum which focuses upon Jews and may refer seek to explore and share the Jewish experience in a given area. Notable Jewish museums include: Albania * Solomon Museum, Berat Australia * Jewish Museum of Australia, Melbourn ...
during the museum's 1964 retrospective of Johns' oeuvre. The following summer, Marden traveled to
Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
, where he began to make compressed charcoal and graphite grid-patterned drawings. Marden's graphic works are a corollary to his paintings, and he would transfer ideas into even his most recent paintings and drawings. Marden made his first monochromatic single-panel painting in the winter of 1964.Brice Marden
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, often referred to as The Guggenheim, is an art museum at 1071 Fifth Avenue between 88th and 89th Street (Manhattan), 89th Streets on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. It hosts a permanent coll ...
, New York.
It was also in Paris that he admired the work of
Alberto Giacometti Alberto Giacometti (, , ; 10 October 1901 – 11 January 1966) was a Swiss sculptor, painter, Drafter, draftsman and Printmaking, printmaker, who was one of the most important sculptors of the 20th century. His work was particularly influenced ...
and
Jean Fautrier Jean Fautrier (; May 16, 1898 – July 21, 1964) was a French painter, illustrator, printmaker, and sculptor. He was one of the most important practitioners of Tachisme. Early life Jean Fautrier was born in Paris in 1898. He was given his unwed ...
, although masters such as Francisco de Zurbarán,
Diego Velázquez Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez (baptised 6 June 15996 August 1660) was a Spanish painter, the leading artist in the Noble court, court of King Philip IV of Spain, Philip IV of Spain and Portugal, and of the Spanish Golden Age. He i ...
, and
Édouard Manet Édouard Manet (, ; ; 23 January 1832 – 30 April 1883) was a French Modernism, modernist painter. He was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism (art movement), R ...
also informed Marden's artistic practice. In 1966, at Dorothea Rockburne's suggestion, Marden was hired by
Robert Rauschenberg Milton Ernest "Robert" or "Bob" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combine painting, Combines (1954â ...
to work as his assistant. That same year, he had his first solo show in New York at the Bykert Gallery, which exhibited the first of his classic oil-and-beeswax paintings. Prior to that he had worked at Chiron Press as an assistant to Steve Poleskie. Marden created the lithograph ''Gulf (from the New York 10-69 portfolio)'' in 1969 while at Chiron Press. In the late 1960s and early '70s, a moment when painting was widely considered moribund, Marden gained international fame as the master of the monochrome panel.
Roberta Smith Roberta Smith (born 1948) is co-chief art critic of ''The New York Times'' and a lecturer on contemporary art. She is the first woman to hold that position at the Times. Education and early life Born in 1948 in New York City and raised in Lawre ...
(October 20, 1991)
Brice Marden Moves Ahead by Turning Back
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
''.
In 1971, Brice and his wife, Helen Harrington, visited the Greek island of Hydra, to which they returned every year thereafter. The couple bought their first home there in 1973.Ted Loos (October 29, 2006)
A Subtle Sense of Place
''The New York Times''.
The light and landscape greatly influenced Marden's work (see, for instance, the five ''Grove Group'' paintings, 1972–1980; ''Souvenir de Grèce'' works on paper, 1974–1996). Executed in oil on marble fragments, he made a total of 31 paintings on marble on Hydra. Marden’s early monochromatic paintings exist as single panels, diptychs, and triptychs. In each of the four ''Red Yellow Blue'' paintings (1974), the artist painted slabs of dense yet nuanced color on three adjoined canvas panels, using oil paint mixed on the spot with melted
beeswax Bee hive wax complex Beeswax (also known as cera alba) is a natural wax produced by honey bees of the genus ''Apis''. The wax is formed into scales by eight wax-producing glands in the abdominal segments of worker bees, which discard it in o ...
and turpentine and applied with a knife and
spatula A spatula is a broad, flat, flexible blade used to mix, spread and lift material including foods, drugs, plaster and paints. In medical applications, "spatula" may also be used synonymously with tongue depressor. The word ''spatula'' derives ...
.Brice Marden: Red Yellow Blue, January 17 - February 23, 2013
''
Gagosian Gallery The Gagosian Gallery is a modern and contemporary art gallery owned and directed by Larry Gagosian. The gallery exhibits some of the most well-known artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. As of 2024, Gagosian employs 300 people at 19 exhibiti ...
, New York.
He gradually increased the number of panels, arranging them into post-and-lintel configurations. In 1977 Brice Marden was commissioned (after an invited art competition with artists Samuel Buri, Joseph Beuys, Alfred Jensen, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, Penck, Robert Ryman,
Antoni Tàpies Antoni Tàpies i Puig, 1st Marquess of Tápies, Marquess of Tàpies (; 13 December 1923 – 6 February 2012) was a Catalans, Catalan painter, sculptor, and art theorist. Life The son of Josep Tàpies i Mestre and Maria Puig i Guerra, Antoni T ...
, and Jim Turrell) to design the windows lining the
apse In architecture, an apse (: apses; from Latin , 'arch, vault'; from Ancient Greek , , 'arch'; sometimes written apsis; : apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical Vault (architecture), vault or semi-dome, also known as an ' ...
of the Basel Cathedral, a project that he labored on continuously from 1978 to 1985. Influenced in part by the Rothko Chapel in
Houston, Texas Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...
, which the artist visited in 1972, Marden painted with the aim of fostering a heightened spiritual environment through abstraction. Occupying the space above the altar, these windows would be central to the ritual activity of the space, and the artist spent the next seven years honing his concept to address the spiritual weight of the installation context, culminating in a limited group of Window Study paintings. After preparing designs for stained-glass windows for Basel Cathedral, he became interested in expressing in his paintings the conditions of colour and light in architecture. The Basel commission saw the artist move away from the understated encaustic monochromes that dominated his output during the 1960s and 1970s to embrace a new, vibrant palette and set of linear compositional devices. In part influenced by his growing interest in alchemy, he decided to work with combinations of colors limited to three (the Trinity) for the linear components and four (the elements - earth, air, fire, water) for the monochrome panels. While the windows were never physically fabricated, Marden’s paintings for the Basel Cathedral endure as masterworks of his oeuvre because of their conceptual aims. In 1977, Marden traveled to Rome and
Pompeii Pompeii ( ; ) was a city in what is now the municipality of Pompei, near Naples, in the Campania region of Italy. Along with Herculaneum, Stabiae, and Villa Boscoreale, many surrounding villas, the city was buried under of volcanic ash and p ...
, where he strengthened his interest in Roman and Greek art and architecture, which would influence his work of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Between 1981 and 1987, Marden made a total of 31 paintings on marble, all of them produced in Hydra.


Later work

In 1983, Marden and family traveled to
Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...
,
Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...
, and
India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
; the artist became fascinated by the art, landscape, and culture of parts of Asia. Marden subsequently incorporated numerous elements of certain Asian traditions into his work, making them one key to his process (the ''Shell Drawings'', 1985–87). A visit in 1984 to the exhibition ''Masters of Japanese Calligraphy, 8th-19th Century,'' encouraged Marden to use form, a predominant influence in his recent work—which can be seen in his acclaimed ''Cold Mountain'' series, both paintings and works on paper, 1989-1991. Combining airy calligraphic scaffoldings of line with whitish or palely tinted backgrounds, these 9-by-12-foot paintings were the biggest Marden had created up to that point. An infatuation with
Chinese calligraphy Chinese calligraphy is the writing of Chinese characters as an art form, combining purely Visual arts, visual art and interpretation of the literary meaning. This type of expression has been widely practiced in China and has been generally held ...
and poetry helped spark the change in his art toward line and gesture, works inspired by the free-spirited eighth-century Chinese hermit and poet of that name (en: Cold Mountain - Han Shan, in Chinese). At first, lines in Marden's paintings and drawings were arranged in neat rows, like Chinese writing. But the lines have got looser, and hence more evocative of landscapes and figures. As a Minimalist, Marden was concerned with grids and patterns. Looking to add freedom to his work without abandoning order, he found Chinese calligraphy inspiring, with its system of drawing characters in rows. In 2000, Marden embarked on ''The Propitious Garden of Plane Image,'' the longest two of which measure 24 feet. Writing in ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...
'' in 2006, the critic Peter Schjeldahl described Marden as "the most profound abstract painter of the past four decades".


Exhibitions

Marden participated in hundreds of group exhibitions, and his work has also been the subject of numerous one-person shows and retrospectives. His first solo show in New York was held at the Bykert Gallery in 1966. In 1972, his work was showcased at
Documenta Documenta (often stylized documenta) is an Art exhibition, exhibition of contemporary art which takes place every five years in Kassel, Germany. Documenta was founded by artist, teacher and curator Arnold Bode in 1955 as part of the Bundesgarte ...
5 in
Kassel Kassel (; in Germany, spelled Cassel until 1926) is a city on the Fulda River in North Hesse, northern Hesse, in Central Germany (geography), central Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Kassel (region), Kassel and the d ...
, Germany. His first museum show was the 1975 retrospective at the
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, often referred to as The Guggenheim, is an art museum at 1071 Fifth Avenue between 88th and 89th Street (Manhattan), 89th Streets on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. It hosts a permanent coll ...
, in New York City. In 1991, Marden was a participant in the Connections series of the
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston The Museum of Fine Arts (often abbreviated as MFA Boston or MFA) is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the list of largest art museums, 20th-largest art museum in the world, measured by public gallery area. It contains 8,161 painting ...
, for which the artist juxtaposed about three dozen of his abstract canvases and works on paper and marble with works from the permanent collection by the likes of
Édouard Manet Édouard Manet (, ; ; 23 January 1832 – 30 April 1883) was a French Modernism, modernist painter. He was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism (art movement), R ...
,
Paul Gauguin Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin (; ; 7 June 1848 – 8 May 1903) was a French painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramist, and writer, whose work has been primarily associated with the Post-Impressionist and Symbolist movements. He was also an influ ...
,
Goya Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (; ; 30 March 1746 – 16 April 1828) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, an ...
,
James Ensor James Sidney Edouard, Baron Ensor (13 April 1860 – 19 November 1949) was a Belgian painter and printmaker, an important influence on expressionism and surrealism who lived in Ostend for most of his life. He was associated with the artistic ...
, and Francisco de Zurbarán. In the fall of 2006, New York's
Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...
, New York, presented "Brice Marden: A Retrospective of Paintings and Drawings". The MoMA called the exhibition "an unprecedented gathering of arden'swork, with more than fifty paintings and an equal number of drawings, organized chronologically, drawn from all phases of the artist's career." The show traveled to the
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern art, modern and contemporary art museum and nonprofit organization located in San Francisco, California. SFMOMA was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th-century art ...
in early 2007, and finally to Berlin's Hamburger Bahnhof, Museum für Gegenwart in the summer of that year. Originally, Marden was not enthusiastic about the idea. The works were divided into two periods: from the mid-sixties to the mid-eighties and then the mid-eighties up to the present. However in the end it allowed the artist to reassess his previous works and focus on future works.


Personal life

In 1960, Brice Marden married Pauline Baez (sister of Joan) and together they had a son, Nicholas. The marriage to Pauline ended a few years later and by 1968 he was remarried to artist Helen Marden. He and Helen Marden have two daughters, Mirabelle and Melia. Brice Marden's son, Nick Marden, is a
bassist A bassist (also known as a bass player or bass guitarist) is a musician who plays a bass instrument such as a double bass (upright bass, contrabass, wood bass), bass guitar (electric bass, acoustic bass), keyboard bass (synth bass) or a low br ...
who has participated in the
New York punk Punk rock (also known as simply punk) is a rock music genre that emerged in the mid-1970s. Rooted in 1950s rock and roll and 1960s garage rock, punk bands rejected the corporate nature of mainstream 1970s rock music. They typically produced sh ...
scene since the late 1970s playing in bands such as the Stimulators and False Prophets. The Mardens' daughter Mirabelle Marden was a proprietor of Rivington Arms, an art gallery in New York. She is also a photographer.Sokol, Brett (2006-12-17), "The Marden Family". ''
The New York Observer ''The New York Observer'' was a weekly newspaper established in 1987. In 2016, it ceased print publication and became the online-only newspaper ''Observer''. The media site focuses on culture, real estate, media, politics and the entertainment ...
''

Melia Marden is the chef of the New York restaurant group The Smile. From 1987 to 2000 Marden’s studio was located on the
Bowery The Bowery () is a street and neighbourhood, neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City, New York. The street runs from Chatham Square at Park Row (Manhattan), Park Row, Worth Street, and Mott Street in the south to Cooper Square at 4th ...
. At the time of his death the artist had a Manhattan studio in a 10th-floor penthouse duplex on West Street with around 5,000 square feet of space and one two-story window looking onto the
Hudson River The Hudson River, historically the North River, is a river that flows from north to south largely through eastern New York (state), New York state. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains at Henderson Lake (New York), Henderson Lake in the ...
. The Mardens bought an estate in
Tivoli, New York Tivoli is a village (New York), village in Dutchess County, New York, Dutchess County, New York (state), New York, United States. The population is 1,012, according to the 2020 census. The village, which was incorporated in 1872 from parts of Upp ...
, called Rose Hill, in 2002. At its center is a stately 1843 main house on a cliff overlooking the Hudson River. The studio was carved out of an old
carriage house A ''carriage house'', also called a ''remise'' or ''coach house'', is a term used in North America to describe an outbuilding that was originally built to house horse-drawn carriages and their related tack. Carriage houses were often two ...
and has been converted into a large, light-filled space with western and northern exposures. At Rainbow Farms, the family's 400-acre summer residence in Eagles Mere, Pennsylvania, since 1991, an old barn was converted to a third workspace with almost no natural light. On Hydra, Marden and his wife traded up houses (as they did elsewhere), moving into the current one in 1989. In 2006, the couple bought a fifth property, Golden Rock Inn, on the Caribbean island of
Nevis Nevis ( ) is an island in the Caribbean Sea that forms part of the inner arc of the Leeward Islands chain of the West Indies. Nevis and the neighbouring island of Saint Kitts constitute the Saint Kitts and Nevis, Federation of Saint Kitts ...
, with plans to build yet another studio there.


Death

Brice Marden died at his home in Tivoli, New York, on August 9, 2023, at the age of 84.


Honors

In 1988, Marden became a member of the
American Academy of Arts and Letters The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, Music of the United States, music, and Visual art of the United States, art. Its fixed number ...
. In 2000,
Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...
awarded the artist an honorary degree of Doctor of Fine Arts.


Art market

Marden was represented by the
Gagosian Gallery The Gagosian Gallery is a modern and contemporary art gallery owned and directed by Larry Gagosian. The gallery exhibits some of the most well-known artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. As of 2024, Gagosian employs 300 people at 19 exhibiti ...
from 2017 on. He had previously worked with the
Matthew Marks Gallery Matthew Marks is an art gallery located in the New York City neighborhood of Chelsea, Manhattan, Chelsea and the Los Angeles neighborhood of West Hollywood. Founded in 1991 by Matthew Marks, it specializes in Modern art, modern and contemporary a ...
for more than twenty years. One of Marden's paintings sold for nearly $3 million at
Christie's Christie's is a British auction house founded in 1766 by James Christie (auctioneer), James Christie. Its main premises are on King Street, St James's in London, and it has additional salerooms in New York, Paris, Hong Kong, Milan, Geneva, Shan ...
in May 2006. Marden’s ''Cold Mountain I (Path)'' (1988–89), managed to almost double his auction record from May 2008 when it sold at
Sotheby's Sotheby's ( ) is a British-founded multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine art, fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, an ...
for $9,602,500 on an $10–15 million estimate. In 2013, Steven A. Cohen sold ''The Attended'' (1996-9) for $10.9 million at Sotheby's New York. On 10 July 2020 an abstract painting by Brice Marden ''Complements'' (2004-2007) sold at Christie´s for $30,920,000 The result brought a new auction record for Marden, almost tripling the artist´s previous milestone of $10.9 million, which had been paid for his striped canvas Number 2 at Sotheby´s in November 2019. Auction prices for Marden are now almost as high as those for an old master like
Rembrandt Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (; ; 15 July 1606 â€“ 4 October 1669), mononymously known as Rembrandt was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker, and Drawing, draughtsman. He is generally considered one of the greatest visual artists in ...
, whose current auction record is $33.2 million.


References


External links


Brice Marden bio at Sotheby´sBrice Marden bio at Christie´sBrice Marden at the Gagosian GalleryBrice Marden's Cold Mountain at the Dia Center Brice Marden bio at Crown Point PressPeter Schjeldahl on Brice Marden at the MoMA, 6 November, 2006Brice Marden Window Study for the Cathedral in Basel
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Marden, Brice 1938 births 2023 deaths 20th-century American male artists 20th-century American painters 20th-century American printmakers 21st-century American painters American abstract painters American male painters Minimalist artists Boston University College of Fine Arts alumni Yale University alumni Yale School of Art alumni People from Briarcliff Manor, New York Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters