Shaped canvas

An experimental method begun in the 1960s among some European and American artists whereby canvas is manipulated to form three-dimensional work and becomes the primary medium itself. This technique of using the traditional support or ground for oil painting to create sculpture is one of the leading-edge artistic innovations that blurred the distinction between painting and sculpture. A reviewer first used the words, "shaped canvas", as a formal term in September 1960 to describe a New York City exhibition at the Leo Castelli Gallery by Frank Stella of minimalist-shaped works that combined painting and canvas. Names of other American artists associated with the movement include Edward Clark, Lee Bontecou, Sven Lukin, Neil Williams, Charles Hinman, Richard Smith, Ellsworth Kelly, Kenneth Noland and Leon Polk Smith. Sources: ???Phaidon Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Art???; Robert Atkins, ???ART-SPEAK??? (LPD)<br><br> A type of painting/stretched canvas first begun in the 1960&#39;s, where the canvas takes other forms than the traditional rectangle. Canvas is stretched over multiple three-dimensional shapes, which are combined to form a three-dimensional, irregularly shaped canvas on which to paint (often abstract or non-objective) images.