NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
Cat. No. 916, unique variant 1, in 918
Untitled, no. 1 of 5, from the series, When Did This Happen?
- State/Variant:
- Only state, unique variant
- Date:
- 2007
- Series:
- When Did This Happen? (View All)
- Alternate Title:
-
Just Like Me
- Themes:
- Abstraction, Body Parts, Figures
- Techniques:
- Etching
- Description:
- panel (a): Soft ground etching, with hand additions
panel (b): Pencil - Support:
- Paper (2 attached sheets)
- Dimensions:
- plate: 59 3/8 × 21 1/2" (150.8 × 54.6 cm); sheet (overall): 59 3/4 × 53 1/2" (151.8 × 135.9 cm)
- Signature:
- panel (a): "LB" lower right comp., pencil.
- Publisher:
- Osiris, New York
- Printer:
- Wingate Studio, Hinsdale, NH
- Edition:
- Unique
- Impression:
- Not numbered
- Edition Information:
- This is one of 2 unique variants outside the edition that incorporate this plate. Both are part of series and are seen in the Evolving Composition Diagram below.
About the "Just Like Me" edition:
Within the edition, sheet size varies from impression to impression. There is 1 known impression of the only state, outside the edition. It is inscribed "first proof" in the lower left composition by the artist, and signed "Louise Bourgeois" in the lower right composition, both in pencil. There are 2 known cancellation proofs, each with a large "X" drawn across the composition from each corner of the plate. - Background:
- Benjamin Shiff, the director of the Osiris imprint, collaborated with Bourgeois in a highly experimental phase of printmaking that occupied the last years of her life, from 2005 to 2010. He first established a working relationship with the artist in the 1990s, but the late period is particularly noteworthy for the innovative and complex large-scale projects that evolved at that time. Shiff made use of professional workshops for printing, but he oversaw the creation of the printing plates as Bourgeois worked on them in her home studio. He also provided assistance as she added extensive hand additions and texts, and as she combined individual compositions into multi-panel works and illustrated books.
- Installation Remarks:
- This panel is one of 5 which constitute a single work of art. All of these panels are to be exhibited together in the indicated sequence.
- Curatorial Remarks:
- The mediums of the hand additions and paper type could not be documented because this work is not in MoMA's Collection and could not be examined in person. The plate dimensions are from the impression in MoMA's Collection. The overall sheet dimensions were provided by the Louise Bourgeois Studio.
© The Easton Foundation/VAGA at ARS, NY
Just Like Me
2007-2009
States
Published
Just Like Me
Only state
2007
Only state
2007
Unique Variants
Published NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
Untitled, no. 1 of 5, from the series, When Did This Happen?
Only state, unique variant
2007
Only state, unique variant
2007
Published NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
Untitled, no. 3 of 3, from the series, Sainte Nitouche
Only state, unique variant
2009
Only state, unique variant
2009
Series
2007
Series
2009
-
NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
-
NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
-
NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
-
NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
-
NOT IN MoMA'S COLLECTION
Louise Bourgeois,
When Did This Happen?,
New York, Osiris, 2007Bourgeois's entire text for this series appears on the panels cited below.
No. 1:
Struck by utter
Revulsion
(I do nothing)
paralyzed.
immobilized by the horror
No. 2:
thunder struck
Freeze on the spot
go totally vague
No. 3:
when did this happen?
when I saw them coupling
separate the two snails
my memory is moth eaten
full of holes
No. 4:
something atrocious must have
happened that I don't
understand
and makes me masochistic
No. 5:
when terror pounces
grips me
I create an image
