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Aquatint, with watercolor, gouache, and pencil additions
Support:
Paper
Dimensions:
sheet: 47 1/2 × 27 7/8" (120.7 × 70.8 cm)
Signature:
"Louise Bourgeois" lower right margin, pencil.
Inscription:
"tout en / rond" left upper middle margin, pencil; "comme le / monde" left middle margin, pencil; [illegible] left lower middle margin, pencil; "une / tache / de soleil" left lower margin, pencil; all artist's hand.
This is one of 4 unique variants that incorporate the plate in Untitled, 2007, seen in the Evolving Composition Diagram. In 2 of these unique variants, the plate is printed with another plate, seen in a second Untitled, 2007, composition, in Related Works in the Catalogue. When the plate is printed alone, the work appears in the Evolving Composition Diagram; when it is printed with the second plate, it appears in Related Works in the Catalogue.
See Evolving Composition Diagram: Untitled "Une Tache de Soleil" Untitled
See Related Works in the Catalogue: Untitled “Je Tombe dans tes Bras” "The Encounter"
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.
Curatorial Remarks:
The color of the hand additions, plate size, and paper type could not be documented because this work is not in MoMA's Collection and could not be examined in person.
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