Betye Saar. Mystic Chart for an Unemployed Sorceress. 1964

Betye Saar Mystic Chart for an Unemployed Sorceress 1964

  • Not on view

The woman in this image prefigures the central character of Saar’s Black Girl’s Window, her hand raised to the viewer, a band of suns and moons above her head. Layers of marks and imagery fill the rest of the composition, with textures from fabric, letters from rubber stamps, and hand-drawn astrological signs and symbols revealing Saar’s interest in incorporating found materials and popular symbols in her prints. Influenced by the work of Joseph Cornell, whose shadow boxes of collected props she saw exhibited in 1967, she would soon transition to using three-dimensional objects in this way.

Gallery label from October 21, 2019–January 4, 2020
Medium
Etching and aquatint
Dimensions
plate: 17 15/16 × 13 3/4" (45.6 × 35 cm); sheet: 19 3/4 × 15 11/16" (50.2 × 39.9 cm)
Publisher
Betye Saar, Los Angeles
Printer
Betye Saar, Los Angeles
Edition
planned edition of 25, 9 known impressions
Credit
The Candace King Weir Endowment for Women Artists
Object number
1180.2018
Department
Drawings and Prints

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