LOUISE BOURGEOIS: COMPLETE BOOKS & PRINTS

Descriptive Title:

Red Bell Jar

Themes:

Body Parts, Figures, Objects

Techniques:

Drypoint, Engraving

Description:

Drypoint and engraving

Support:

Smooth, wove Yugen paper

Dimensions:

plate: 8 x 5 1/4" (20.3 x 13.4 cm); sheet: 15 1/8 x 11 15/16" (38.4 x 30.4 cm)

Signature:

"Louise Bourgeois 2000" lower right margin, pencil.

Publisher:

Harlan & Weaver, New York

Printer:

Harlan & Weaver, New York

Edition:

25; plus 7 A.P., 5 P.P., 2 H.C., 1 B.A.T., and an edition of 6 on fabric

Impression:

"a.p. 6/7" lower left margin, pencil, unknown hand.

Edition Information:

There are 3 known variant impressions of state XIII, outside the two editions.

The 4 impressions of varying states labeled "HC" in red ink, in the artist's hand, are not conventional H.C. impressions, which would be of the final state.

The paper edition is printed in red ink and the fabric edition is printed in black ink.

State Changes and Additions:

Changes from state XII in drypoint: figure's body reinforced, and figure's hair further delineated vertically and below.

Other Remarks:

According to Louise Bourgeois’s assistant, Jerry Gorovoy, the bell jar-like form in “Hair” was not done in conjunction with Bourgeois’s monumental sculptural installation for Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall, in 2000. In that installation, each of three huge steel towers included, within it, a small sculpture depicting a mother and child inside a bell jar. Bourgeois’s print “Do Not Abandon Me,” with similar imagery and seen here in Related Works in the Catalogue, does have a direct relationship to the Tate installation.

MoMA Credit Line:

Gift of the artist

MoMA Accession Number:

29.2002

© The Easton Foundation/VAGA at ARS, NY