id: 142806 accession number: 1966.50 share license status: Copyrighted url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1966.50 updated: 2023-04-01 11:07:50.526000 Student (Costume Study for Goll's "Methusalem") (recto) Amalie, Ida, and Set Designs (Studies for Goll's "Methusalem") (verso), 1922. George Grosz (German, 1893–1959). Pen and brown-black ink (applied with the aid of drafting tools) and watercolor; sheet: 52.7 x 38 cm (20 3/4 x 14 15/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Contemporary Collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art 1966.50 © Estate of George Grosz / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY title: Student (Costume Study for Goll's "Methusalem") (recto) Amalie, Ida, and Set Designs (Studies for Goll's "Methusalem") (verso) title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 1922 creation date earliest: 1922 creation date latest: 1922 current location: creditline: Contemporary Collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art copyright: © Estate of George Grosz / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY --- culture: Germany, Berlin, 20th century technique: Pen and brown-black ink (applied with the aid of drafting tools) and watercolor department: Drawings collection: DR - German type: Drawing find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * George Grosz (German, 1893–1959) - artist --- measurements: Sheet: 52.7 x 38 cm (20 3/4 x 14 15/16 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: inscription: upper right, in graphite: 6; by artist upper left, in brown ink: Dort kann er knacken und klirren beim sprechen [sideways along edge]; by artist, upper left, near figure's shoulder, in brown ink: Dampf / beim sprechen / von Zeit zu Zeit / aufzischen; by artist, upper left, below previous inscription, in brown ink: Zähne gleich / alten / Klaviertasten; by artist, lower right in brown ink: Kopf Maske/aufgeklappt / großes Talglicht mit / aufmontierte elektr. Birne /als Licht, von beleuchter; by artist, lower right, in brown ink: Student [underlined twice]; by artist, lower right, below previous inscription: Füße Riesen/streichholz/schachteln; lower left, in graphite: 38; by artist, bottom right, in graphite: No ["o" underlined twice] 16) zu Goll "Methusalem" translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Dada Revisited opening date: Dada Revisited. Akron Art Museum (organizer). title: Golden Anniversary of Acquisitions opening date: 1966-09-10T04:00:00 Golden Anniversary of Acquisitions. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 10-October 16, 1966). title: Tendencies of the Twenties opening date: 1977-08-14T04:00:00 Tendencies of the Twenties. Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin 19, Germany (August 14, 1977-October 16, 1978); Städelsches Kunstinstitut im Städtischen Kunstinstitut Frankfurt am Main, Franfurt am Main, Germany (November 10, 1977-January 8, 1978). title: Dada and Surrealism Reviewed opening date: 1978-01-11T05:00:00 Dada and Surrealism Reviewed. Hayward Gallery, London, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (January 11-March 27, 1978). title: Dada Revisited opening date: 1978-06-30T04:00:00 Dada Revisited. Akron Art Museum, Akron, OH (organizer) (June 30-September 15, 1978). title: DADA: Berlin, Cologne, Hannover opening date: 1980-11-05T05:00:00 DADA: Berlin, Cologne, Hannover. The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Boston, MA (November 5, 1980-January 4, 1981); Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, TX (March 3-April 19, 1981). title: Art and the Stage opening date: 1981-05-22T04:00:00 Art and the Stage. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 22-August 16, 1981). title: Robots: History, Fantasy, & Reality opening date: 1985-12-01T05:00:00 Robots: History, Fantasy, & Reality. Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Madison, WI (organizer) (December 1-January 19, 1985). title: Cross Section: Graphic Art in Germany after the First World War opening date: 1989-10-10T04:00:00 Cross Section: Graphic Art in Germany after the First World War. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 10, 1989-January 7, 1990). title: Directions in Drawing II: The Human Figure opening date: 1991-11-05T05:00:00 Directions in Drawing II: The Human Figure. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 5, 1991-January 12, 1992). title: The German Tradition opening date: 1993-04-27T04:00:00 The German Tradition. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (April 27-June 27, 1993). title: Graphic Discontent: German Expressionism on Paper opening date: 2018-01-14T05:00:00 Graphic Discontent: German Expressionism on Paper. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (January 14-May 27, 2018). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * George Grosz. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (January - February 1954). --- PROVENANCE (Galerien Flechtheim, Berlin/Düsseldorf) date: ?-? footnotes: *
according to old label
citations: (Eugene Victor Thaw, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH) date: ?-1966 footnotes: citations: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1966- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: George Grosz's interest in mechanization extended to his drawing practice: he used drafting tools, like a straight-edge and compass, to execute works such as this one. digital description: Student belongs to a series of drawings George Grosz made for Iwan Goll’s 1921 play Methusalem: The Eternal Bourgeois. This satirical drama pitted a radical student against Methusalem, a bourgeois capitalist. Grosz’s drawing shows the student’s costume; the actor would have spoken from behind a full-size, mask-like shield made from various machine parts and other commonplace objects. The hinged metal head reveals the inner workings of a corrupt or incompetent mind. In Grosz’s characterization, neither the radical student nor the bourgeois capitalist was more righteous than the other. Grosz was an outlier to Expressionism, rejecting the idea of the artist as mystical prophet in favor of the artist as an ordinary worker, an idea inspired by the socialist rhetoric of the day. wall description: Student is one of a series of drawings George Grosz made for Iwan Goll’s 1921 play Methusalem: The Eternal Bourgeois. This satirical drama pitted a radical student against Methusalem, a bourgeois capitalist. Grosz’s drawing shows the student’s costume; the actor would have spoken from behind a full-size, mask-like shield made from various machine parts and other commonplace objects. The hinged metal head reveals the inner workings of a corrupt or incompetent mind. In Grosz’s characterization, neither the radical student nor the bourgeois capitalist was more righteous than the other. Grosz was an outlier to Expressionism, rejecting the idea of the artist as mystical prophet in favor of the artist as an ordinary worker, an idea inspired by the socialist rhetoric of the day. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Baur, John Ireland Howe. George Grosz. Exh. Cat. New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1954. page number: Mentioned: pp. 16-17, no. 36; Reproduced: p. 16 url: Rubin, William S. Dada and Surrealist Art. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1968. page number: Mentioned: p. 88; Reproduced: plate 76 url: West, Richard. "Figure for Yvan Goll's Methusalem." Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 55, no. 4 (April 1968): 90-94. page number: Mentioned: pp. 90-94; Reproduced: p. 91 url: 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. 3 url: https://archive.org/details/20thCenturyArtCMA/page/n3 Ashton, Dore. "A Planned Coincidence." Art in America 57 (September-October 1969): 36-47. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 40-41 url: Tendenzen der Zwanziger Jahre. Exh. Cat. Berlin: Akademie der Künste, 1977. page number: Mentioned: p. 3, p. 261; Reproduced: p. 3, p. 51 url: Ades, Dawn. Dada and Surrealism Reviewed. Exh. Cat. London: Hayward Gallery, 1978. page number: Mentioned: p. 94 url: Wohl, Helmut. DADA: Berlin, Cologne, Hannover. Exh. Cat. Boston: Institute of Contemporary Art, 1980. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 12, p. 26 url: Breitman, Ellen. Art and the Stage. Exh. Cat. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1981. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 29, no. 14 url: DeShong, Alan. The Theatrical Designs of George Grosz. Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Research Press, 1982. page number: Mentioned: p. 43; Reproduced: plate 14 url: Webb, Michael. "The Robots Are Here! The Robots Are Here!" Design Quarterly, no. 121 (1983): 4-21. page number: Mentioned: p. 11; Reproduced: p. 10 url: Myers, Trent. Robots: History, Fantasy, & Reality. Exh. Cat. Madison, WI: Madison Art Center, 1985. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 3, insert url: Taylor, Sue and Richard A. Born. The David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection. New York: Hudson Hills Press, 1990. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 113 url: Cleveland Museum of Art, Diane DeGrazia, and Carter E. Foster. Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art in association with Rizzoli International Publications, New York, 2000. page number: Mentioned: P. 246-47, 297; Reproduced: P. 247-248, cat. no. 104 url: 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 and Reproduced: P. 65, no. 63 url: --- IMAGES