Robert Mangold was born in 1937 in North Tonawanda, New York. Mangold was one of the founding members of the Minimalist movement in the 1960s. In 1965 the Jewish Museum in New York held the first major exhibition of Minimalist art and included Mangold’s work. In 1967, he won a National Endowment for the Arts grant and in 1969, a Guggenheim Fellowship. Two years later he had his first solo museum exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum. He has been featured in the Whitney Biennial four times in 1979, 1983, 1985, and 2004.
In 1997, art critic and writer wrote that Mangold’s paintings “are more complicated to describe than they seem, which is partly what’s good about them: the way they invite intense scrutiny, which, in the nature of good art, is its own reward.” His works are often comprised of simple elements that are put together through complex means. Mangold’s paintings challenge the typical connotations of what art is or could be, and his works often appear as objects rather than images.
His works are included in many museums including the Museum of Modern Art (New York), the Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Tate Collection (London). He is represented by The Pace Gallery. Mangold lives and works in New York.
