Joan Mitchell

Joan Mitchell (February 12, 1925 – October 30, 1992) was an American artist who worked primarily in painting and printmaking, and furthermore used pastel and made extra works upon paper. She was an sprightly participant in the New York School of artists in the 1950s. A native of Chicago, she is allied with the American abstract expressionist movement, even even if she lived in France for much of her career.

Mitchell's emotionally intense style and its gestural brushwork were influenced by nineteenth-century post-impressionist painters, particularly Henri Matisse. Memories of landscapes inspired her compositions; she famously told art critic Irving Sandler, "I carry my landscapes on the subject of with me." Her later feint was informed and constrained by her declining health.

Mitchell was one of her era's few female painters to gain critical and public acclaim. Her paintings, drawings, and editioned prints can be seen in major museums and collections roughly speaking the world, and have sold for record-breaking prices. In 2021, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and Baltimore Museum of Art co-organized a combination retrospective of her work.

In her will, Mitchell provided for the instigation of the Joan Mitchell Foundation, a non-profit corporation that awards grants and fellowships to effective artists and maintains her archives.