Which artist created the 'Black Paintings' in the late 1950s?

Frank Stella created the “Black Paintings” in the late 1950s.

Stella made the series between 1958 and 1960, producing 24 stark paintings of evenly spaced black stripes on bare canvas. He used commercial enamel paint and a housepainter’s brush, leaving narrow strips of canvas visible between the stripes. The works rejected the gestural brushwork and emotional drama associated with Abstract Expressionism.

The paintings became a breakthrough for Stella and an important precursor to Minimalism. Four were shown in the Museum of Modern Art’s influential 1959–60 exhibition Sixteen Americans, bringing the young artist major attention. Their rigid geometry also reflected the physical dimensions of the wooden stretcher beneath the canvas.

A common mix-up is confusing Stella’s Black Paintings with later monochrome or striped work by artists such as Ellsworth Kelly, Kenneth Noland, or Gene Davis. Stella’s famous phrase “What you see is what you see” captures the series’ emphasis on surface, structure, and material rather than hidden symbolism.