Robert Motherwell Paintings and Collages: A Catalogue Raisonné 1941 – 1991 Volume 3 - Flipbook - Page 51
c44
c44
Figure in Black
Alternative Titles: Girl with Stripes;
{Figure in Black (Girl with Stripes)}
1947
Oil and pasted paper on board
23⅞ x 19¾ in. (60.6 x 50.2 cm)
Motherwell, ca. 1976; Dedalus
Foundation, 1991; Smithsonian
American Art Museum, Washington,
D.C., 1995
solo exhibitions
Samuel M. Kootz Gallery, New York,
October 1949, as Girl with Stripes.
inscriptions
Recto, upper right, incised: R.M. 47
Knoedler & Company, New York,
February 1981, cat. no. 20.
Verso not seen [“verso top center,
handwritten in black paint: ‘Girl with
Stripes,’ ” per Smithsonian American
Art Museum]
Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo,
1983 (traveling), cat. no. 11, color illus.
p. 62.
Verso not seen [“verso center, oil:
R Motherwell 47,” per Smithsonian
American Art Museum]
artist’s studio number
c47-5
present owner
Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Gift of the Dedalus Foundation and
museum purchase, 1995.2.1
provenance
Samuel M. Kootz Gallery, 1947;
Horace Richter, before 1960; Robert
Mint Museum of Art, Charlotte, N.C.,
1960 (traveling), cat. no. 62, illus. p. 10,
as Girl with Stripes.
Columbia Museum of Art, S.C., 1963,
cat. no. 55, illus. p. 6, as Girl with
Stripes.
Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de
Paris, 1977 (not in catalogue).
Hayward Gallery, London, 1978,
cat. no. 15.37.
Cleveland Museum of Art, 1979,
cat. no. 91, illus. p. 151.
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum,
New York, 1984, cat. no. 5.
City Art Centre and Fruitmarket
Gallery, Edinburgh, 1981, cat. no. 25.
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 1985
(traveling), cat. no. 70.
Washburn Gallery, New York, 1993,
cat. no. 1.
Fundació Antoni Tàpies, Barcelona,
1996 (traveling), cat. no. 6, color illus.
p. 83.
Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum,
Florida International University,
Miami, 2008 (traveling), color illus.
p. 177.
group exhibitions
Galerie Maeght, Paris, 1947, as Jeune
Fille Aux Rayures (Young Girl with
Stripes).
Des Moines Art Center, 1950, cat.
no. 58, as Girl with Stripes.
1985b, illus. n.p. (fig. 183); Tucker 1987,
sec. 2, p. 8; Flam 1991, color illus. n.p.
(pl. 13); Lynton 1997, p. 41, color illus.
p. 41; Chalumeau 1998, p. 6, illus. p. 6
(fig. d), Lynton 2001, p. 181, color illus.
p. 180, referred to in text and in illus. as
Figure in Black (Girl with Stripes).
comments
The head of the figure is painted on the
only collage element in this work, a
pasted-down piece of the same German
wrapping paper that Motherwell had
been using in collages since 1943
(see The Flute, c6). This collage was
first shown as Girl with Stripes, and
later retitled by the artist Figure in
Black after he reacquired it. The title
Figure in Black (Girl with Stripes), which
combines the two earlier titles, was
given to the work posthumously,
shortly before it was acquired by the
Smithsonian American Art Museum.
references
S[harp] 1949, p. 22, as Girl With Stripes;
Bowness 1978, color illus.; Hasiotis
1983, color illus. n.p. (fig. 1); Hughes
1983, p. 68, color illus. p. 68; Mattison
co lla ges
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