“High Yellow” is an abstract oil painting created by artist Ellsworth Kelly in 1960. This artwork represents the Color Field Painting and Hard Edge Painting movements, and it is housed in the Blanton Museum of Art, which is part of the University of Texas in Austin, TX, USA.
The painting consists of a large yellow ellipse centered on a blue rectangular background that fills the top two-thirds of the canvas. There’s a sharp, horizontal division where the blue meets a green block of color, which covers the lower third of the canvas. This juxtaposition of colors and the clearly defined shapes are characteristic of Kelly’s approach to form and hue, underlining his contributions to the Hard Edge style and Color Field movement. The size of the yellow ellipse in proportion to the blue background, and its placement in the composition, creates a dynamic tension and a sense of buoyancy within the overall picture. The flat, unmodulated colors contribute to the painting’s sense of austerity and its rejection of figurative representation, emphasizing pure form and color as the primary means of communication.
