Kenneth Noland grew up in Asheville, N.C. and enrolled at Black Mountain in 1946, taking advantage of the G.I. Bill after his discharge from the air force. While his work’s preoccupation with color and geometry certainly took cues from the theories of art department head Josef Albers, Noland later downplayed his influence and the two were said to have disliked one another personally. Noland has pointed instead to the direct influence of another Black Mountain instructor, Ilya Bolotowsky, in shaping his aesthetic. Indeed, the influence of European geometric abstraction on Noland’s work, such as from the Bauhaus and De Stilj, can be traced to his studies with Bolotowsky.