Early in his career Kelly avidly sketched ideas on ordinary scraps of paper, constantly refining imagery he found in the world. Many of these shapes and images eventually made their way into his paintings and sculptures. The biomorphic form in Blue and Yellow, drawn on a page from a weekly planner, echoes the shape in the painting Red Blue (1962).

Kelly's first solo museum exhibition was held in 1963 in Washington, DC. The accompanying catalogue included an interview with Henry Geldzahler in which Kelly discussed sketching and its importance to his artistic practice:

Henry Geldzahler: Do you work from sketches? Do you adjust and change the idea of the sketch as you work on the canvas?

Ellsworth Kelly: Yes. I work from drawings and sometimes collage; the drawing always comes first and then collage later because it’s easier to think about color that way… Sometimes I follow the original idea exactly if the idea is solved. But most of the time there have to be adjustments during the painting. Through the painting of it I find the color and I work the form and play with it and it adjusts itself.