# Larry Poons artist context and auction value notes

Canonical page: https://appraisily.com/artist/larry-poons/
Profile generated: 2026-05-18T19:35:27.462Z
Quality: high confidence, strong sources

## Artist identity

- Birth date: 1937-10-01
- Nationality: American
- Movements: Op Art, Abstract Painting, Post-Painterly Abstraction
- Common media: Acrylic painting, Oil painting, Works on paper, Prints

## About Larry Poons

Larry Poons (born 1937, Tokyo, Japan) is an American abstract painter whose career spans more than six decades. Initially trained in musical composition at the New England Conservatory of Music, Poons turned to painting after encountering Barnett Newman's work in 1959. He gained early recognition for precisely plotted optical paintings—dots and ellipses on monochromatic fields—featured in MoMA's landmark 1965 exhibition "The Responsive Eye." By 1966 he shifted toward a more physical, paint-forward practice, emphasizing poured pigment and tactile surfaces. Poons was the youngest artist in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's 1970 survey "New York Painting and Sculpture, 1940–1970," alongside de Kooning and Pollock. He has taught at the Art Students League of New York and continues to paint, working from New York City and upstate New York.

## Common works and media

Poons is primarily known as a painter. His early 1960s works are acrylic paintings of dots and ellipses against monochromatic backgrounds, generated through mathematical plotting systems. From the late 1960s onward, his practice shifted to large-format canvases with poured and layered paint, emphasizing surface texture and color density. Works on paper, prints, and mixed-media pieces also appear in auction records. Dimensions range from modest works on paper to large-scale canvases.

## Market and appraisal context

Larry Poons's works appear regularly at auction, with over 300 recorded lots. Collectors most frequently encounter paintings from his 1960s Op Art period and his later poured-paint abstractions. Valuation depends on period and style, medium, dimensions, provenance, exhibition history, and condition. Early dot-and-ellipse paintings typically attract the strongest institutional and collector interest. Works with documented gallery or museum exhibition records carry a premium. His extensive exhibition history at MoMA, the Met, and Tate provides a solid provenance framework for authentication.

## Appraisily data basis

Appraisily artist pages combine artist identity research with auction records, auction-house context, sale dates, realized prices, and comparable lots when those records are available. For Larry Poons, identity and biographical data are sourced from the artist's official site, Getty ULAN, VIAF, RKD, Tate, MoMA, Wikidata, and Wikipedia.

## Sources

- Larry Poons: https://larrypoons.com/
- RKD: https://rkd.nl/en/explore/artists/64247
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q327862
- VIAF: https://viaf.org/viaf/95803983/
- Getty Vocabulary Program: https://vocab.getty.edu/page/ulan/500019976
- Tate: https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/larry-poons-1788
- The Museum of Modern Art: https://www.moma.org/artists/4691
- Library of Congress: https://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n82013450
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Poons