27 September 2013-5 January 2014
Devoted exclusively to papier collés and related works on paper from the 1940s and early 1950s by Robert Motherwell, this exhibition features nearly sixty artworks and examines the American artist’s origins and his engagement with collage. The exhibition also honours Peggy Guggenheim’s early patronage of the artist. At her urging, and under the tutelage of émigré Surrealist artist Matta, Motherwell first experimented with the papier collé technique. He recalled years later: “I might never have done it otherwise, and it was here that I found . . . my ‘identity.’” By cutting, tearing, and layering pasted papers, Motherwell reflected the tumult and violence of the modern world, establishing him as an essential and original voice in postwar American art. Motherwell initially produced both figural and abstract collages, but by the early 1950s Surrealist influences prevalent in these first works had given way to his distinctive mature style, which was firmly rooted in Abstract Expressionism.
This exhibition is organized by Susan Davidson, Senior Curator, Collections and Exhibitions, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.
This exhibition is supported by the Terra Foundation for American Art with additional funding from the Dedalus Foundation, Inc.
(adapted from the gallery’s press materials)
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INFORMATION
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
1071 Fifth Avenue
New York, New York 10128 USA
(212) 423-3500
Hours:
Sunday-Wednesday and Friday, 10AM-5:45PM
Saturday, 10AM-7:45PM
Image:
Pancho Villa, Dead and Alive
by Robert Motherwell
28″x36″
gouache, ink, oil, and pasted German decorative paper, colored paper, Japanese paper, and wood veneer on paperboard
1943
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Purchase
© Dedalus Foundation, Inc./Licensed by VAGA, New York
Photo: © The Museum of Modern Art, courtesy Dedalus Foundation, Inc.