Red with White Triangle 1961

Carmen Herrera created this painting, titled "Red with White Triangle," using acrylic on canvas. The stark simplicity of Herrera's work stands in contrast to the Abstract Expressionism that dominated the New York art scene when she began working. Her geometric abstraction, with its clean lines and flat planes of color, was a deliberate departure, aligning more closely with the European minimalist tradition. But it was also a powerful statement by a Cuban-born artist, staking her claim in a field still largely dominated by white males. The use of a triangle is not accidental. Herrera has spoken of her fascination with architecture, and we might consider the triangle here as a kind of structural element, a supporting form. To understand Herrera's project more fully, we would need to explore the network of galleries and museums that promoted certain kinds of abstraction and excluded others. It is only through such contextual research that we can truly appreciate the radicalism of Herrera's seemingly simple forms.