{
"data": {
"id": 140208,
"accession_number": "1964.2",
"share_license_status": "Copyrighted",
"tombstone": "Composition Concrete (Study for Mural), 1957\u20131960. Stuart Davis (American, 1894\u20131964). Oil on canvas; framed: 130.5 x 72 x 9.5 cm (51 3/8 x 28 3/8 x 3 3/4 in.); unframed: 108.6 x 50.8 cm (42 3/4 x 20 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Contemporary Collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1964.2. \u00a9 Estate of Stuart Davis / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY",
"current_location": "226B American Modern",
"title": "Composition Concrete (Study for Mural)",
"creation_date": "1957\u20131960",
"creation_date_earliest": 1957,
"creation_date_latest": 1960,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"America"
],
"technique": "oil on canvas",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "American Painting and Sculpture",
"collection": "American - Painting",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Framed: 130.5 x 72 x 9.5 cm (51 3/8 x 28 3/8 x 3 3/4 in.); Unframed: 108.6 x 50.8 cm (42 3/4 x 20 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"framed": {
"height": 1.305,
"height_inch": 51,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.375,
"width": 0.72,
"width_inch": 28,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.375,
"depth": 0.095,
"depth_inch": 3,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.75
},
"unframed": {
"height": 1.086,
"height_inch": 42,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.75,
"width": 0.508,
"width_inch": 20,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": "\u00a9 Estate of Stuart Davis / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY",
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "Signed middle right (in script): Stuart Davis; signed, dated and inscribed on stretcher: Stuart Davis May 1957/ Mural--Lobby Wall/ scale 2 1/2\" to 1'/ Heinz Res'ch Lab. Pitts. Pa.",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 304723,
"title": "Year in Review (1964)",
"description": "Year in Review (1964). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 8, 1964-January 31, 1965).",
"opening_date": "1964-12-08T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 320892,
"title": "Stuart Davis Memorial Exhibition, 1894-1964",
"description": "Stuart Davis Memorial Exhibition, 1894-1964. National Collection of Fine Arts, Washington, DC (organizer) (May 28-July 5, 1965); The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL (July 30-August 29, 1965); Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY (September 14-October 17, 1965); University of California, Los Angeles (October 31-November 28, 1965).",
"opening_date": "1965-05-28T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 310260,
"title": "American Cities: The Artist's View",
"description": "American Cities: The Artist's View. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 17, 1989-January 7, 1990).",
"opening_date": "1989-10-17T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 211664,
"title": "Stuart Davis",
"description": "Stuart Davis. Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, Venice (June 3-September 28, 1997); Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome (October 22, 1997-January 12, 1998); Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (February 1-May 1, 1998); National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC (May 30-September 1, 1998).",
"opening_date": "1997-06-03T00:00:00"
},
{
"id": 181802,
"title": "The Persistence of Geometry: Form, Content and Culture in the Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art",
"description": "The Persistence of Geometry: Form, Content and Culture in the Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland (MOCA), Cleveland, OH (June 9-August 20, 2006).",
"opening_date": "2006-06-09T00:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "The Downtown Gallery, New York, Stuart Davis: Exhibition of Ten of the Paintings Used as Color Illustrations in \"Stuart Davis\" by Rudy Blesh, May 10-June 4, 1960 (pamphlet), no. 10 as Study for Mural -- Heinz Co. Research Center.",
"opening_date": "1960-05-10T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "The Downtown Gallery, New York, Group Show - 1st Floor, November 8-December 3, 1960 (checklist) as Mural-Lobby Wall.",
"opening_date": "1960-11-08T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Twenty Seventh Biennial Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting, January 14-February 26, 1961 (booklet), no. 24 as Lobby Wall.",
"opening_date": "1961-01-14T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "The Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio, 26th Annual Mid-year Show, July 2-September 4, 1961, no. 39 as Mural Lobby.",
"opening_date": "1961-07-02T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Mary Washington College, Fredericksburg, Virginia, Mary Washington Annual, October 1962 (as Mural--Lobby Wall).",
"opening_date": "1962-10-01T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "The artist; (The Downtown Gallery, New York, NY), January 4, 1964",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "1964",
"sortorder": null
},
{
"description": "(The Downtown Gallery, New York, NY, December 1964, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1964",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1964-",
"sortorder": 3
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": "Davis was one of the first artists to incorporate elements from advertising in his work.",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "Davis\u2019s dynamic abstraction is a study for a large mural he created for the H. J. Heinz Research Center in Pittsburgh. The numerals 1957\u2014placed sideways with the last two digits playfully inverted\u2014are visible at the lower left of the composition. Here the artist not only refers to the year he started this painting, but also wittily riffs on the famous Heinz slogan \u201c57 Varieties.\u201d
Davis remarked that this painting\u2019s title evokes \u201cconcrete music,\u201d an avant-garde composition consisting of seemingly random combinations of pre-recorded sound. With its apparently improvised shapes and colors, his canvas
visualizes this experimental concept.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60469162"
],
"internet_archive": []
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Munro, Cynthia, \"We Hitch Our Wagons: Stuart Davis and Cynthia.\" (interview with the artist). Mademoiselle, vol. 45, no. 4, August 1957.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 266",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Stuart Davis: Exhibition of Ten of the Paintings Used as Color Illustrations in \"Stuart Davis\" by Rudi Blesh (exhibition pamphlet). New York: The Downtown Gallery, 1960.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: cover",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Twenty Seventh Biennial Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting (exhibition booklet). Washington, D.C.: The Corcoran Gallery of Art, 1961.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: cat n. 24",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art, \u201cRecent Acquisitions Press Release,\u201d February 19, 1964, Cleveland Museum of Art Archives.",
"page_number": null,
"url": "https://archive.org/details/cmapr1209"
},
{
"citation": "Henning, Edward B. \"The Language of Art.\" CMA Bulletin 51 (November, 1964), pp. 224-225, repr. p. 225, color illus. p 209.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 224; Reproduced: p. 209, 225",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Kozloff, Max. \"Larry Rivers, Stuart Davis and Slang Idiom.\" Artforum 4 (November, 1965).",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 24",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 203",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1966/page/n227"
},
{
"citation": "\"Recent Accessions in the American Field.\" Art in America 54 (May-June, 1966).",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 46",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 203",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1969/page/n227"
},
{
"citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art. Art of the Twentieth Century in the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Dept. of Art History & Education, CMA, 1969.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 4",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/20thCenturyArtCMA/page/n5"
},
{
"citation": "Kelder, Diane, ed. Stuart Davis. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1971.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: plate 26",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Urdang, Beth. Stuart Davis: Murals. Zabriskie Gallery exhibition catalog, January 27- February 14, 1976.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 4; Reproduced: n. 17",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 253",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1978/page/n273"
},
{
"citation": "Teilman,Herdis B. \"Composition Concrete, 1957, by Stuart Davis.\" Carnegie Magazine (May, 1980).",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 9; Reproduced: p. 8",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wilkin, Karen. Stuart Davis. New York Abbeville Press Publishers, 1987.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 193",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "CMA Handbook, 1991.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 154",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Sims, Lowery Stokes. Stuart Davis: American Painter. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1991.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: 142,296; Reproduced: p. 297",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Rylands, Philip, ed. Stuart Davis. Milan, Electa, 1997. p. 180, 181, cat. no. 54.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 180; Reproduced: p. 181, n. 54",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Sims, Lowery Stokes. The Persistence of Geometry: Form, Content and Culture in the Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2006.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 121; Reproduced: p. 34, n. 96",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "\"Year in Review for 1964.\" CMA Bulletin 51 (December, 1964).",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 266, n. 156",
"url": null
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1964.2",
"images": {},
"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "Contemporary Collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": "Hammond Hemmelgarn Family Gallery",
"athena_id": 140208,
"creators": [
{
"id": 3420,
"description": "Stuart Davis (American, 1894\u20131964)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": null,
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1894",
"death_year": "1964",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1964-12-19T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1957,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "1957\u20131960",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "object",
"conservation_statement": null,
"has_conservation_images": false,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": false,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [
"Study for Mural"
],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-08-21 12:43:16.467000"
}
}