GENERAL DESCRIPTION
The circular forms of Arthur Dove's early experiments in abstraction combine with brilliant, varied colors, expressing his highly personal response both to nature and to the nature of painting. Produced during his last, difficult year in Geneva, New York, where he had moved in 1933 to settle his parents' estate, this small painting exemplifies Dove's mature style.
Dove was one of the earliest American artists to commit totally to abstraction, which he did after spending two years in France, where he absorbed both the colors and the increasingly nonrepresentational forms of Paul Cézanne and Henri Matisse. His friendship with photographer and art impresario Alfred Stieglitz resulted in exposure at Stieglitz's influential galleries An American Place and 291, which helped attract young American artists to abstraction.
Excerpt from
Wiliam Keyse Rudolph, DMA label copy, 2005
NOTES
Created in 1938
From Steve Nash 143:
Virtually nothing is known about the early history of this painting, other than the fact that it belonged to Edith Halpert of The Downtown Gallery, a loyal Dove supporter. Even its subject is enigmatic. In an effort to find pictorial equivalents for personal impressions and responses and for natural processes, Dove worked from observation toward subjective interpretation, but his paintings nearly always retain a suggestive element of natural form no matter how abstract they become. Here, however, there are few clues of an underlying motif. Judging from the title and the painting's dark organic shapes we may be in a forest interior looking up an alley or clearing that is hemmed in by thick forest growth. A spatial passage seems to open toward the center of the painting, surrounded by the upward expanding rhythms of green, brown, and russet, and at the heart of that opening is a mysterious cross of red over a vertical mass of white. Whether this is a figure or cross or pure improvisation is conjectural. At any rate, the important consideration in Dove's work is not a literal translation of subject but the painting's expressive effect, and here we have a strong sense of enclosure and dark mood that reflects the pastoral mysticism so central to Dove's lifelong attitude toward nature.
Fun fact full citation: The New Yorker, March 4, 1974 Georgia O'Keeffe's Vision by Calvin Tomkins
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Place of origin: Geneva (New York/United States): TGN: 2069365
Process/materials
Historical periods
Individuals
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RELATED OBJECTS
PROVENANCE
n.d.: The Downtown Gallery, New York
n.d.: Stephen Hahn Gallery, New York
n.d.: Mrs. and Mrs. Lawrence S. Pollock
From 1984: Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence S. Pollock
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WEB RESOURCES
- Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History~Learn more about Arthur Dove from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
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FUN FACTS
- Georgia O'Keeffe discussed the work of Arthur Dove in a 1974 article in The New Yorker: "I think Dove came to abstraction quite naturally," O'Keeffe says, reflectively. "It was his way of thinking. Kandinksy was very showy about it, but Dove had an earthy, simple quality that led directly to abstraction. His things are very special. I always wish I'd bought more of them. And all the people Dove influenced, who are better ,known than he is! The Museum of Modern Art never gave him a really important show—I don't know why. Dove used to paint a lot of small pictures, little landscapes, that din't look particularly distinguished at first, but in them he would get the feel of a particular place so completely that you'd know he'd been there."
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General Description
The circular forms of Arthur Dove's early experiments in abstraction combine with brilliant, varied colors, expressing his highly personal response both to nature and to the nature of painting. Produced during his last, difficult year in Geneva, New York, where he had moved in 1933 to settle his parents' estate, this small painting exemplifies Dove's mature style.
Dove was one of the earliest American artists to commit totally to abstraction, which he did after spending two years in France, where he absorbed both the colors and the increasingly nonrepresentational forms of Paul Cézanne and Henri Matisse. His friendship with photographer and art impresario Alfred Stieglitz resulted in exposure at Stieglitz's influential galleries An American Place and 291, which helped attract young American artists to abstraction.
Excerpt from
Wiliam Keyse Rudolph, DMA label copy, 2005
Fun Facts
- Georgia O'Keeffe discussed the work of Arthur Dove in a 1974 article in The New Yorker: "I think Dove came to abstraction quite naturally," O'Keeffe says, reflectively. "It was his way of thinking. Kandinksy was very showy about it, but Dove had an earthy, simple quality that led directly to abstraction. His things are very special. I always wish I'd bought more of them. And all the people Dove influenced, who are better ,known than he is! The Museum of Modern Art never gave him a really important show—I don't know why. Dove used to paint a lot of small pictures, little landscapes, that din't look particularly distinguished at first, but in them he would get the feel of a particular place so completely that you'd know he'd been there."
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Notes
Created in 1938
From Steve Nash 143:
Virtually nothing is known about the early history of this painting, other than the fact that it belonged to Edith Halpert of The Downtown Gallery, a loyal Dove supporter. Even its subject is enigmatic. In an effort to find pictorial equivalents for personal impressions and responses and for natural processes, Dove worked from observation toward subjective interpretation, but his paintings nearly always retain a suggestive element of natural form no matter how abstract they become. Here, however, there are few clues of an underlying motif. Judging from the title and the painting's dark organic shapes we may be in a forest interior looking up an alley or clearing that is hemmed in by thick forest growth. A spatial passage seems to open toward the center of the painting, surrounded by the upward expanding rhythms of green, brown, and russet, and at the heart of that opening is a mysterious cross of red over a vertical mass of white. Whether this is a figure or cross or pure improvisation is conjectural. At any rate, the important consideration in Dove's work is not a literal translation of subject but the painting's expressive effect, and here we have a strong sense of enclosure and dark mood that reflects the pastoral mysticism so central to Dove's lifelong attitude toward nature.
Fun fact full citation: The New Yorker, March 4, 1974 Georgia O'Keeffe's Vision by Calvin Tomkins
Catalogue essays
Artist/designers
Cultures
Geography
Place of origin: Geneva (New York/United States): TGN: 2069365
Process/materials
Historical periods
Individuals
Subject terms
RELATED OBJECTS
PROVENANCE
n.d.: The Downtown Gallery, New York
n.d.: Stephen Hahn Gallery, New York
n.d.: Mrs. and Mrs. Lawrence S. Pollock
From 1984: Dallas Museum of Art, gift of Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence S. Pollock
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