Stephen Mueller

Stephen Mueller (September 24, 1947 in Norfolk, Virginia – September 16, 2011 in New York City, New York) was an American painter whose color auditorium and Lyrical Abstraction canvases took a approach towards pop. He earned his B.F.A. in painting from the University of Texas, Austin in 1969 and his M.F.A. at Bennington College in 1971 where the assume of Clement Greenberg and the color field teacher ran high; although he used that style as a stepping off point while incorporating many vary spiritual symbols and motifs, so as not to remain extremely abstract.

As avowed in the Brooklyn Rail: "Islamic art, Indian miniature painting, Mexican ceramics, Tantra painting, the color theory of Philipp Otto Runge, the spiritual aura found in German Romanticism, music, textile design, and a perplexing knowledge of Eastern philosophy everything contributed to shaping his vision. After abandoning gestural deletion in the late 1980s, and considering it a focus upon earth tones, Stephen turned to color wholeheartedly. By the prematurely 1990s, his palette was saturated with adept hues. It is one of the artist’s striking achievements that his work, despite everything spectral indulgence, never seems flat."

In 2003 a retrospective of his put it on was held at the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha, Nebraska. Mueller died of lung cancer upon September 16, 2011, he was 63.

Mueller's pretend is held in the collections of the Brooklyn Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, Denver Art Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston among additional venues.