Joseph Stella

Born in Muro Lucano, Italy, Stella grew up in Europe, coming to the United States in 1896 to study medicine. He rapidly abandoned this plan and studied art with William Merritt Chase at the New York School of Art. An extraordinary draftsman, he found work as an illustrator in the early 1900s. He returned to Italy in 1909 and associated with the Italian Futurists, pushing his art toward the dynamic urban modernism for which he is best known. Although best remembered for his Cubist and Futurist inflected images of Coney Island and the Brooklyn Bridge, Stella depicted a wide range of subjects in various styles throughout his career.