Robert Motherwell Paintings and Collages: A Catalogue Raisonné 1941 – 1991 Volume 3 - Flipbook - Page 418
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Blue Air
Alternative Title: Blue Window
1946
Oil on paperboard
41½ x 28⅜ in. (105.4 x 72.1 cm)
inscriptions
Recto, upper left: Motherwell 46
artist’s studio number
p46-5057
present owner
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture
Garden, Smithsonian Institution,
Washington, D.C. Gift of Joseph H.
Hirshhorn, 1966
provenance
Samuel M. Kootz Gallery, 1946; private
collection; [Parke-Bernet Galleries,
Inc., New York, February 6, 1957, lot
61]; Joseph H. Hirshhorn, 1957;
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture
Garden, Smithsonian Institution,
Washington, D.C., 1966
group exhibitions
Trabia-Morris Gallery, New York, 1962,
erroneously as Blue Aire.
406
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture
Garden, Smithsonian Institution,
Washington, D.C., 1974, cat. no. 700,
color illus. p. 483.
Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art,
Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., 1978
(traveling); shown in Ithaca and New
York only.
Sidney Mishkin Gallery, Baruch
College, New York, 1995, cat. no. 36,
illus. p. 15.
Museu d’Art Contemporani de
Barcelona, 2007, color illus. p. 373.
references
New York Post 1978, illus. sec. B, p. 121
(detail); Mattison 1985b, pp. 178–79,
illus. n.p. (fig. 154); Mattison 1987,
p. 147, illus. p. 155 (fig. 61).
comments
In a letter to Motherwell dated
September 3, 1974, Charles W. Millard,
then a curator at the Hirshhorn Museum
and Sculpture Garden, reported that
“Blue Window” is inscribed on the
verso of this work, but that backing
board has now been removed. In
paintings on p a p e r an d p a p e r b o a r d
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Motherwell’s response to Millard’s
questions regarding the true title of the
work, he confirmed his preference for
the title Blue Air.
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The Blue Sun
Alternative Title: Coca Cola Sun (?)
1946
Oil on paperboard
40 x 30 in. (101.6 x 76.2 cm)
inscriptions
Recto, upper left, incised: Motherwell
46
Verso: “the blue sun” R. Motherwell
1946
artist’s studio number
p46-4
present owner
Dedalus Foundation
provenance
Dedalus Foundation, 1991
solo exhibitions
Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de
Paris, 1977.
group exhibitions
Municipal Art Center, Long Beach,
Calif., 1952, as Coca Cola Sun (?).
