LOUISE BOURGEOIS: COMPLETE BOOKS & PRINTS

Themes:

Abstraction

Techniques:

Lithography

Description:

Lithograph

Support:

Smooth, wove BFK Rives paper

Dimensions:

composition and sheet: 27 3/16 x 30" (69 x 76.2 cm)

Signature:

"LB" right lower comp., pencil.

Publisher:

The artist

Printer:

SOLO Impression, New York

Edition:

70; plus 20 A.P., 6 T.P., 4 P.P., 2 B.A.T.

Impression:

"AP 2" left lower comp., pencil, unknown hand.

State Changes and Additions:

Matrices:
The progression of this composition, as seen in the Evolving Composition Diagram below, included 8 lithography matrices.

Plate 1: light blue background.

Plate 2: yellow areas.

Plate 3: orange areas.

Plate 4: dark blue areas.

Plate 5: magenta areas.

Plate 6: red half circles.

Plate 7: red diagonal line.

Plate 8: black areas.

State Changes:
Changes from state II, in plate 1, in lithography: background area expanded.

Benefit Work:

For Round World Projects. No further information for this organization could be found at the time of cataloguing.

Background:

Stanley William Hayter founded the print workshop Atelier 17, which he relocated from Paris to New York during WWII. Bourgeois worked there intermittently until 1949, enjoying the company of an array of international artists. Bourgeois found Hayter intimidating as he demonstrated engraving, but remembered feeling useful in the shop because she could facilitate communication with the artists who spoke only French. "Le Cauchemar de Hayter," seen below in Related Works in Other Mediums, is another work that references the printmaker.

Other Remarks:

According to the artist's assistant Jerry Gorovoy, Bourgeois was reminded of Hayter in the 1990s when she met Hayter's daughter. While revisiting some earlier drawings, the artist remembered the difficulties she had with the engraving burin, especially when making long, curved forms like the ones seen here.

MoMA Credit Line:

Gift of the artist

MoMA Accession Number:

134.2000

This Work in Other Collections:

Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Cambridge, MA

© The Easton Foundation/VAGA at ARS, NY