Cy Twombly
1928–2011

Introduction

Edwin Parker "Cy" Twombly Jr. (; April 25, 1928 – July 5, 2011) was an American painter, sculptor and photographer.

Twombly influenced artists such as Anselm Kiefer, Francesco Clemente, Julian Schnabel and Jean-Michel Basquiat. His best-known works are typically large-scale, freely-scribbled, calligraphic and graffiti-like works on solid fields of mostly gray, tan, or off-white colors. His later paintings and works on paper shifted toward "romantic symbolism", and their titles can be interpreted visually through shapes and forms and words. Twombly often quoted poets such as Stéphane Mallarmé, Rainer Maria Rilke and John Keats, as well as classical myths and allegories, in his works. Examples of this are his Apollo and The Artist and a series of eight drawings consisting solely of inscriptions of the word "VIRGIL".

Twombly's works are in the permanent collections of modern art museums globally, including the Menil Collection in Houston, the Tate Modern in London, New York's Museum of Modern Art and Munich's Museum Brandhorst. He was commissioned for a ceiling at the Musée du Louvre in Paris.

In a 1994 retrospective, curator Kirk Varnedoe described Twombly's work as "influential among artists, discomfiting to many critics and truculently difficult not just for a broad public, but for sophisticated initiates of postwar art as well."

Wikidata identifier

Q159566

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Introduction

Twombly studied from 1948 to 1951 at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, VA, at the Museum School in Boston, and at the Art Students League in New York, where he met Robert Rauschenberg, who suggested that Twombly attend Black Mountain College, 1951-1952. In 1957 he relocated to Italy, where he would remain for the rest of his life, making Rome his primary residence. He is most well known for his large paintings populated with scribbled marks, calligraphic or graffiti-like words, letters, numbers, and references to Classical culture. He also produced prints, sculpture, and photographic works.

Country of birth

United States

Roles

Artist, lecturer, painter, photographer, sculptor

ULAN identifier

500032301

Names

Cy Twombly, Edwin Parker Twombly, Jr. Edwin Parker Twombly

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Information from the Getty Research Institute's Union List of Artist Names ® (ULAN), made available under the ODC Attribution License. Accessed April 12, 2024.