If we want to situate Pascal van der Graaf within arthistory, the keyword is clear: “Shaped Canvas.”

But this term is not about decorative form. It represents afundamental question: What is painting?

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I. 1964 — What Happened at The Shaped Canvas?

In 1964, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New Yorkpresented an exhibition titled The Shaped Canvas, curated by LawrenceAlloway (1926–1990, born in the UK, later active in New York as a critic andcurator).

The exhibition did not invent shaped painting — it gave aname to something already emerging.

It posed a simple but radical question: Does a canvas haveto be rectangular?

The rectangle seems neutral. In fact, it is highlystructured. It predetermines:

• how we compose
• how we read space
• how we understand visual order

When artists altered the outer contour of the canvas, theywere not redesigning surfaces. They were challenging the rules themselves.

The shaped canvas was not stylistic variation. It wasstructural dissent.

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II. Frank Stella: Refusing Illusion

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Frank Stella (1936–2024, born in Massachusetts; active inNew York in the late 1950s–60s) famously declared:

“What you see is what you see.”

This was not a casual remark. It was a rejection ofillusionistic space.

After Abstract Expressionism had pushed emotional depth andspatial drama to their limits, Stella chose not to create “space” that did notphysically exist.

In Irregular Polygons (1965–66), the contour of thecanvas determines the composition.

In the Protractor Series (1967–71), color and curvedstructure eliminate perspectival illusion.

The painting does not open into space — it remains anobject. He did not add content. He removed illusion. And removal is oftenharder than addition.

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III. Ellsworth Kelly: Shape as Being

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Ellsworth Kelly (1923–2015, born in New York State; lived inParis 1948–1954 before developing his mature language in New York) approachedthe issue even more directly:

If painting is reduced to color and shape — why retain therectangle?

In Yellow Piece (1966), the entire canvas becomes asingle form. It does not depict shape. It is shape.

If Stella rejected illusion, Kelly dismantled composition.

When the rectangle disappears, painting is no longer animage inside a frame. It becomes a presence on the wall.

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IV. When the Canvas Enters Space

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After the 1960s, some artists went further.

Charles Hinman (b. 1932, New York) created works thatphysically project from the wall. Painting ceased to be a flat surface andbecame a constructed structure.

Later, Steven Parrino (1958–2005, born in New York) twistedand compressed stretched canvases, transforming painting into a tense,sculptural object.

Different methods. One shared concern: Painting no longerpretends to contain space. It becomes space.

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V. Lucio Fontana: Opening the Surface

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Lucio Fontana (1899–1968, born in Rosario, Argentina; activein Italy and founder of Spatialism) began cutting canvases in 1958.

He did not alter the outer shape of the painting. Instead,he sliced through it. Real space penetrated the surface.

Fontana is not strictly a shaped-canvas artist, but heconfronted the same question:

Is painting a plane —
or an opening?

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VI. Returning to Pascal: Rethinking the Container

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When Pascal decided in 2022 to fold canvas as if it were paper, he was not repeating history. He was extending a trajectory.

Stella rejected illusion.
Kelly made shape primary.
Hinman pushed the canvas into space.
Parrino twisted it into tension.
Fontana cut it open.

Pascal folds it.

His gesture is neither destructive nor violent. It isstructural.

The fold generates volume through tension. The canvasbecomes a body shaped before it is stretched. With the addition of automotivecolor-shifting paint, the viewer’s angle becomes part of the work itself.

This shift may appear formal. Infact, it alters the entire logic of looking.

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Visit Information
Dates/ Time: Feb 19–28, 2026, 15:00
Location: B1, No. 78, Fuxi Rd., Xinying Dist., Tainan, Taiwan

Bug 2 Gallery