Robert Grosvenor

The recorded working language is English. The field of work recorded is visual arts, art of sculpture and installation art. Places of work recorded in the authority are Philadelphia and New York City. Work by Robert Grosvenor is recorded in the collections of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Whitney Museum of American Art, Museum of Modern Art and Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. Distinctions recorded are Guggenheim Fellowship.

• Name — Robert Grosvenor • Birth Name — Robert Strawbridge Grosvenor • Born — 31 March 1937 • Birthplace — New York City, U.S. • Died — 3 September 2025 • Place of death — East Patchogue, New York, U.S. • Education — École des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs. University of Perugia • Known for — Sculpture • Movement — Minimalism • Children — 3

Grosvenor was born March 31, 1937, in Manhattan, New York City. He studied at the in 1956; at the École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs, Paris in 1957 and 1959; and at the University of Perugia in 1958. He was inspired by Lucio Fontana and Piero Manzoni who he had been warned against while studying. He returned to New York for military service in 1959 during which time he came into contact with Mark di Suvero who introduced him to other artists.

Grosvenor was one of the 10 artists that founded the cooperative Park Place Gallery in New York City, open from 1963 to 1967. The other founders of the gallery included Mark di Suvero, Dean Fleming, Forrest Myers, Peter Forakis, Leo Valledor, Tamara Melcher, Tony Magar, and Edwin Ruda. In Grosvenor's work, he employed a mixture of industrial materials such as car body parts, plexiglass, stone, brick, concrete, and plastic. His earlier works were large wooden structures, reminiscent of the work of Ronald Bladen, hung or cantilevered above the exhibition space and later moved on to work that viewers could walk through or under. One of his best known sculptures is Tapanga (1965), originally exhibited in the mid-1960's and later realized in a monumental version at the Storm King Art Center. His work has helped define minimalism and was included in the seminal group exhibitions, Primary Structures (Jewish Museum, 1966), and Minimal Art (Gemeentemuseum Den Haag, 1968). His choice to work with rugged materials and found objects following the 1960s distanced him from minimalism. Grosvenor seldom spoke of the meaning behind his work and rarely gave his works titles.

Grosvenor was represented by Paula Cooper Gallery since 1968, when the gallery opened. Grosvenor briefly left the gallery in 2023. Karma Gallery and Galerie Max Hetzler also showed his work.

In 1960, Grosvenor married Verta Smart; they had a daughter and later divorced. In 1965, he married Jacqueline Gardner, with whom he had two children. Grosvenor died from kidney cancer at his home in East Patchogue, New York, on September 3, 2025, at the age of 88.

• 2020 – Ezratti Family Prize for Sculpture award, ICA Miami, Miami, Florida • 1972 – American Academy of Arts and Letters grant • 1970, 1983 – Guggenheim Fellowship • 1970 – National Endowment for the Arts grant

List of select exhibits by Grosvenor:

• 2025, Robert Grosvenor, Fridericianum, Kassel, Germany • 2019–2021, Robert Grosvenor, ICA Miami, Miami, Florida • 1992, Kunsthalle Bern, Bern, Switzerland