ROMULUS x THE ARMORY SHOW, SEPTEMBER 24–27, 2026ROMULUS x THE ARMORY SHOW, SEPTEMBER 24–27, 2026
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ROMULUS x THE ARMORY SHOW, SEPTEMBER 24–27, 2026ROMULUS x THE ARMORY SHOW, SEPTEMBER 24–27, 2026
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Al Held, The Red X

Al HeldThe Red X, 1965

Acrylic on board

22 7/8 x 28 3/4 in, 58.1 x 73 cm

About the artist

Al Held A pioneer of hard-edged abstraction, American painter Al Held (1928–2005) created works of great complexity that acknowledged the then-dominant painterly vocabulary of American abstraction at the same time as being profoundly informed by a history of painting rooted in the European Renaissance. During his 50-year career, Held single-mindedly committed to an exploration of the potential for abstraction to reach beyond the realm of the viewer’s primary senses. Continually expanding his painterly language and practice, often in opposition to the dominant ideologies, as the painter and his former student Michael Craig-Martin wrote: ‘His work remained rigorous, and uncompromising, challenging one’s perceptual pre-conceptions and intelligence, rather than conforming to received wisdom or flattering good taste.’[1]

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