Robert Carroll was an American artist born in 1934. With an international career, Carroll studied at the Cleveland Institute of Art and the Western Reserve University. Upon graduation in 1957, he cultivated an interest in nuclear physics during his obligatory stint in the armed forces; afterwards he became friends with protagonists of the beat generation Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. Another friend was Willem De Kooning, whose artistic style, Abstract Expressionism, would influence Carroll.
Carroll moved to Rome when he was 25, and quickly became part of a local circle of intellectuals that included Elio Vittorini and Salvatore Quasimodo. Although he married an Italian, Carroll never applied for Italian citizenship; to make up for that, the town of Massa conferred honorary citizenship on him in 2015. He was primarily known for his painting as well as for multimedia installations that harmonized images and sound. To read more in Italian, visit Florence’s La Repubblica news site.
Carroll passed on September 4, 2016 at the age of 84 in Massa Carrara in Tuscany, Italy.
