Leo Valledor

Born in San Francisco, Leo Valledor (1936–1989) was a Filipino American artist known for his shaped canvases, in which he experimented with the spatial aspects of color. Losing both of his parents by the time he was 12, Valledor grew up in the Fillmore District and saw jazz and Beat poetry as powerful influences. In 1955, when he was only 19, he held his first solo show at the legendary Six Gallery. Valledor spent the 1960s in New York, where he co-founded the Park Place Gallery Group. In geometric paintings that furthered the hard-edge movement, Valledor used the shaped canvas to manipulate what the viewer saw. Valledor returned to San Francisco in 1968, where he maintained a relatively low profile as an artist and teacher until his death in 1989. His contribution to the arts has only recently been fully appreciated; he is now recognized as a maverick of Minimalism.

Lesson 1: Putting Together the Puzzle: Leo Valledor’s Shaped Canvases

Lesson 2: A “vibration I can see”: Jazz in Leo Valledor’s Art

Lesson 3: “Color affects space”: Leo Valledor, Race, and Reception

Lesson 4: “When you look at it from an angle”: Perceiving Leo Valledor’s Art 

Lesson 5: What Leo Valledor’s Titles Tell Us