Artist: Robert Motherwell (American, 1915-1991)

Title: Africa Suite, Number 10

Audio:

Date: 1970

Dimensions: 40 3/4″ x 28 1/4″

Location in Library: Fourth floor

Media: Screenprint, works on paper

Owner: The Brooklyn College Library Collection. © Dedalus Foundation and VAGA (Visual Artists and Galleries Association, Inc.)

Description:

By the 1950’s Motherwell had moved away from automatism and toward spontaneous brushwork and bold, simple forms inspired by Chinese and Japanese brush painting. Motherwell said that “abstract rhythms, immediately felt, could be an expression of the inner self.”

Black and white are the predominant colors in many of Motherwell’s works; he said, “Black is death, anxiety; white is life . . .” In Motherwell’s works, these colors also evoke printed words, symbols, brilliant shadows, and the extremes of darkness and light.

Related Websites
– Robert Motherwell at PBS
– Robert Motherwell at Guggenheim Collection
– Robert Motherwell at MoMA

Suggested Readings
– Engberg, Siri. Robert Motherwell: The Complete Prints 1940-1991: Catalogue Raisonné, 2003.
Call Number: NE539 .M67 A4 2003
– Motherwell, Robert. The Collected Writings of Robert Motherwell, 1999.
Call Number: ND237.M852 A35 1999