Robert Motherwell Paintings and Collages: A Catalogue Raisonné 1941 – 1991 Volume 3 - Flipbook - Page 428
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Fishes with Red Stripe
1952–54
Oil on paper mounted on board
42½ x 41¼ in. (108 x 104.8 cm)
inscriptions
Recto not signed, not dated
Verso not seen [“signed, inscribed with
title, and dated 1954 on the reverse,”
per Christie’s 1987]
artist’s studio number
p54-5169
present owner
Private collection
provenance
Mr. and Mrs. John Murray Cuddihy,
1955; [Christie’s, New York, November
3, 1978, lot 10, illus.]; Salander-O’Reilly
Galleries, New York, 1978; private collection, 1980; [Christie’s, New York,
November 3, 1987, lot 14, illus. (not
sold)]; private collection, 1987
solo exhibitions
Sidney Janis Gallery, New York, May
1957, cat. no. 4.
Museu de Arte Moderna, São Paulo,
Brazil, 1961, cat. no. 11, illus. n.p.
Pasadena Art Museum, Calif.,
February 1962, cat. no. 19.
Smith College Museum of Art,
Northampton, Mass., 1963, cat. no. 7,
illus. n.p.
New Gallery, Charles Hayden Memorial
Library, Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, Cambridge, 1963.
Museum of Modern Art, New York,
Robert Motherwell, September 1965
(traveling), New York, cat. no. 26, illus.
p. 80; Amsterdam, cat. no. 22, illus.
n.p.; Essen, cat. no. 22; Turin, cat.
no. 22, illus. p. 80 (pl. 20/B).
Museum of Modern Art, New York,
1967 (circulating), Buenos Aires, cat.
no. 4, illus. n.p.; Caracas, cat. no. 59;
Bogotá, cat. no. 59; Mexico City, cat.
no. 4.
Städtische Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, 1976
(traveling), cat. no. 16, illus. p. 102.
Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de
Paris, 1977, illus. n.p.
Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh,
1977.
Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1978,
cat. no. 7.
416
Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo,
1983 (traveling), cat. no. 24, color illus.
p. 14, erroneously as Fishes with Red
Stripes; not shown in Washington, D.C.
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum,
New York, 1984, cat. no. 19.
group exhibitions
Whitney Museum of American Art,
New York, 1955 (traveling), illus. p. 59.
Museum of Modern Art, New York,
1958 (circulating), Madrid, cat. no. 47;
Amsterdam, cat. no. 47; Brussels, cat.
no. 47; Paris, cat. no. 46; London,
cat. no. 46; not shown in New York.
American Federation of Arts, New
York, 1968 (circulating), cat. no. 21,
illus. n.p.
references
Goodrich et al. 1957, illus. p. 250;
Seldis 1962b, illus. sec. A, p. 24;
Motherwell in Smith College Museum
of Art exh. cat. 1963, n.p.; Edgar 1965,
p. 39, illus. p. 40 (fig. 4); Arnason
1966b, pp. 27, 28, 31, illus. p. 23;
Arnason 1977b, pp. 33, 37, 50, illus. n.p.
(pl. 91); Hilton 1978, p. 63; Arnason
1982, pp. 33, 37, 50, color illus. p. 127
(pl. 138); Motherwell in Arnason 1982,
p. 127; Motherwell in Albright-Knox
Art Gallery exh. cat. 1983, p. 13, color
illus. p. 14, erroneously as Fishes with
Red Stripes; Baitz 1984, sec. Reader’s
Guide, p. 15, illus. sec. Reader’s Guide,
p. 15; Kangas 1984, sec. Arts & Leisure;
Regan 1984, sec. Review, p. 12; Berman
1985, p. 65; Danto 1985, p. 59; New
York Insurance Exchange 1986, p. 1,
cover color illus., illus. p. 1; Danto 1987,
p. 50; Pleynet 1989b, p. 88, color illus.
p. 88; Flam 1991, pp. 10–11, color illus.
n.p. (pl. 32); Chalumeau 1998, color
illus. p. 32 (pl. 29); Ashton and Banach
2007, illus. p. 223.
comments
This work was initially composed as
part of a large preparatory sketch for a
tapestry design that Motherwell created
for the Temple Beth El synagogue in
Springfield, Massachusetts (see fig. 204
in volume 1). At one point, Motherwell
cut a fragment from the large sketch
and transformed it into an autonomous
work that would eventually become
Fishes with Red Stripe.
Although this work has frequently
been dated simply to 1954, its origins
in the tapestry project indicate that it
was in fact painted largely between
December 1952, when the project was
paintings on p a p e r an d p a p e r b o a r d
initiated, and May 1953, when the completed tapestry was exhibited at the
Samuel M. Kootz Gallery prior to its
final installation in the synagogue.
Fishes with Red Stripe is referred to
as Motherwell’s “last picture” (i.e., his
most recent work) on a curators’ preliminary list dated January 13, 1954, for
the traveling exhibition The New Decade:
35 American Painters and Sculptors, which
opened at the Whitney Museum of
American Art in May 1955 (Whitney
Museum of American Art Artists’ Files
and Records). A revised version of that
list cites the work simply as “Painting”
and dates it to 1954, with a curator’s
annotation “Fish with Red Stripe”
added in pencil above this reference.
The dating of the work to 1954 at that
time reflects Motherwell’s decision
that January to have the surviving fragment of his tapestry design stand as an
autonomous work, and his decision at
that time to have the work mounted
on board.
Almost a decade later, in a statement Motherwell wrote for the catalogue of his 1963 solo exhibition at
Smith College, he noted, “This painting is one of my favorites. I was making
a curtain for a synagogue. It was to
hang the whole height of the wall and
then come out on the floor underneath
the Ark. In thinking about the floor
part, I thought that fishes have some
Old Testament meaning. . . . I decided
to put ‘fishes swimming’ underneath.
The present painting is the sketch for
the fishes beneath the Ark” (Motherwell
in Smith College exh. cat. 1963, caption
to plate 7, n.p.). Years later, Motherwell
said, “Fishes with Red Stripes involves
the void as well as figuration; it also
involves both spontaneity and correction in equal measure. In a way, it is
close to what I have been after all my
painting life” (Motherwell in AlbrightKnox Art Gallery exh. cat. 1983, p. 13).
