After graduating in 1976 from Elmira College with a Bachelor of
Arts degree he began his illustrious career in the
mailroom of the William Morris Agency as part of the company's Agent in Training Program.
From 1959, Flavin was shortly employed as a
mailroom clerk at the Guggenheim Museum and later as guard and elevator operator at the Museum of Modern
Art, where he met Sol LeWitt, Lucy Lippard, and Robert Ryman.