Robert Motherwell Paintings and Collages: A Catalogue Raisonné 1941 – 1991 Volume 3 - Flipbook - Page 536
w289
w289
Open Study No. 5
Alternative Titles: Open Drawing No. 4;
Open Drawing with Charcoal Lines
1968
Acrylic and charcoal on paper
22 x 30¼ in. (55.9 x 76.8 cm)
inscriptions
Recto, upper right: RM 68
Recto, lower right: 5
Verso (on strainer, reattached):
motherwell
artist’s studio number
d68-1498
present owner
Dedalus Foundation
provenance
Dedalus Foundation, 1991
solo exhibitions
Robischon Gallery, Denver, 2001, cat.
no. 12.
Marlborough Gallery, New York, 2002.
Bernard Jacobson Gallery, London,
October 2008.
524
group exhibitions
Institut Mathildenhöhe, Darmstadt,
Germany, 1970, cat. no. 369, illus.
p. 150, as Open drawing with charcoal
lines.
Marlborough Galleria d’Arte, Rome,
1972, cat. no. 23, illus. n.p., as Open
Drawing with Charcoal Lines.
references
Marlborough-Gerson Gallery exh. cat.
1969, illus. n.p., as ‘Open’ Drawing
No. 4; Chandler 2001a, sec. D, p. 4;
MacMillan 2001a, sec. FF, p. 4;
MacMillan 2001b, illus. sec. H, p. 2;
Paglia 2001, p. 53; Mattison et al. 2009,
color illus. p. 22.
comments
This work and related paintings on
paper began as charcoal drawings, to
which Motherwell subsequently added
small but very significant strokes of
white paint (see also w291 and w293–
w295). This work is the first numbered
painting on paper in the Open Study
series; the works with lower numbers
are not included here because they
paintings on p a p e r an d p a p e r b o a r d
were not painted on and remain classified as drawings. In fact, this work was
given two different numbers. It was
published as ‘Open’ Drawing No. 4 in
the catalogue for the first exhibition of
the Open series (Marlborough-Gerson
Gallery exh. cat. 1969), and it was also
later exhibited as Open Drawing with
Charcoal Lines. The “5” inscribed in the
lower right corner, however, shows that
Motherwell designated it as number 5
in the series.
The numbering of the Open Study
works was quite irregular, full of gaps
and repetitions. Some of the works were
also given descriptive subtitles. To further complicate matters, Motherwell
did studies for his Open series in various mediums—paintings, paintings on
paper, and drawings—so the numbering of them within any given medium is
inherently prone to irregularity.
Some of the works in this series,
such as this one, had series numbers
inscribed in pencil very near a corner;
but these numbers were sometimes
ignored as a result of being cropped
out of reproductions.
This painting on paper served as
a model for three large canvases: Open
No. 124, Open White and Black, and
Open No. 184 (p506–p508).
