11.20.81

Frank Lobdell

Frank Lobdell used etching to create this tense, dramatic composition. Lobdell, like a number of Abstract Expressionists, preferred to title his work using the date he did it rather than influence the viewer with a title.

This intaglio was printed at 3EP Ltd. in Palo Alto, California with Master Printer Ikuru Kuwahara. The press name referred to three equal partners, which were Paula Kirkeby, Mary Margaret (Moo) Anderson, and printmaker Joseph Goldyne.

Frank Lobdell left for Paris in 1951 and enrolled in the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere. Walt Kuhlman joined him in Paris and they were included in the exhibition 6erne Salon des Realites Nouvelles at the Petit Palais in 1951. That same year Lobdell returned to San Francisco and established a studio and was an influential part of the San Francisco Abstract Expressionist movement in the 1950s.

His distinguished teaching career began in 1957 at the California School of Fine Arts where, according to art historian and critic Thomas Albright, "he was one of the most influential teachers." In 1966, he was Artist-in-Residence at Stanford University and he joined the Stanford faculty the following year. He was Professor of Art until his retirement from Stanford in 1991.