On view at the Brandywine Museum of Art from July 29, 2023 – February 18, 2024.

Andrew Wyeth once said, “My struggle is to preserve that abstract flash like something you caught out of the corner of your eye” and on numerous occasions called himself an abstract artist. Prompted by these statements, this exhibition at the Brandywine Museum of Art is the first to focus on this major American artist’s interest in the abstract art of his contemporaries and the roots of his own practice in abstract methods that will be revelatory to many who think they know the full story of this iconic creative life.

A remarkable body of abstract watercolors from the Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Collection that have never previously been exhibited will take their place on the walls of the newly renovated Andrew Wyeth Gallery alongside archival materials that document his encounters with abstract expressionism and geometric abstraction. This body of work presents a collective portrait of an artist who was open to new ideas others found challenging and for whom abstraction was a legitimate and vital direction alongside the realism for which he is better known.

More Info about this exhibit

*Image credit: Andrew Wyeth, Untitled, 1961, watercolor on paper. Collection of the Wyeth Foundation for American Art, B0920. © Wyeth Foundation for American Art/Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY