“Pollock dripped, Frankenthaler poured, Morris Louis poured, Howard Mehring sprinkled,” said Paul Reed. “I blot.” Born in 1919 in Washington, D.C., Reed began not in a studio but in the world of 1950s New York graphic design—a training ground that shaped his exacting sense of color and structure. By the 1960s, Reed had become a member of the Washington Color School, a circle of painters experimenting with pure color, stained canvases, and a scintillating strain of American abstraction. Here in Oklahoma City, the first retrospective devoted to Reed traces his evolution from designer to painter, gathering work from across his six-decade career. —Elena Clavarino