{
"data": {
"id": 147478,
"accession_number": "1973.211",
"share_license_status": "Copyrighted",
"tombstone": "First Theme, 1963. Burgoyne Diller (American, 1906\u20131965). Oil on canvas; framed: 231 x 99 x 4 cm (90 15/16 x 39 x 1 9/16 in.); unframed: 228.6 x 96.5 cm (90 x 38 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund, 1973.211. \u00a9 Estate of Burgoyne Diller / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY",
"current_location": null,
"title": "First Theme",
"creation_date": "1963",
"creation_date_earliest": 1963,
"creation_date_latest": 1963,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"America"
],
"technique": "oil on canvas",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Contemporary Art",
"collection": "CONTEMP - Painting",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Framed: 231 x 99 x 4 cm (90 15/16 x 39 x 1 9/16 in.); Unframed: 228.6 x 96.5 cm (90 x 38 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"framed": {
"height": 2.31,
"height_inch": 90,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.9375,
"width": 0.99,
"width_inch": 39,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0,
"depth": 0.04,
"depth_inch": 1,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.5625
},
"unframed": {
"height": 2.286,
"height_inch": 90,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.0,
"width": 0.965,
"width_inch": 38,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": "\u00a9 Estate of Burgoyne Diller / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY",
"inscriptions": [],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 301878,
"title": "Year in Review: 1973",
"description": "Year in Review: 1973. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 30-March 17, 1974).",
"opening_date": "1974-01-30T05:00:00"
},
{
"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": "\"Burgoyne Diller Exhibition,\" Walker Art Center, Minn. (Dec. 1971 - Jan.16, 1972), Dallas Museum of Fine Arts (Feb. 16 - March 26, 1972), Pasadena Art Museum (May 9 - July 2, 1972).",
"opening_date": "1972-02-16T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (Spring 1973).",
"opening_date": "1973-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "\"Year in Review 1973,\" CMA (1974).",
"opening_date": "1974-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "\"Burgoyne Diller,\" Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (Sept. 14 - Nov. 26, 1990).",
"opening_date": "1990-09-14T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "MOCA Cleveland (6/9/2006 - 8/20/2006): \"The Persistence of Geometry: Form, Content and Culture in the Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art\", no. 102, p. 122, color repr. p. 66.",
"opening_date": "2006-06-09T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": "During the Great Depression, while trying to support his education at the Art Students League, Diller painted signs for restaurants in exchange for meals.",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "For much of his long and productive career, Burgoyne Diller sought to create the illusion of volume and space through colors on a flat surface. He pursued this effort by exploring three themes, all involving geometric forms against contrasting backgrounds. In \"First Theme\" paintings, floating rectangular shapes are dominant. In \"Second\" and \"Third Theme\" works, these elements become part of increasingly complex grid systems. The controlled and ordered tensions in this First Theme painting result from a long and painstaking process of creation. Diller composed his works by arranging colored paper rectangles on a canvas. When satisfied with their placement, he removed them and painted the shapes in primary colors, as well as black, white, and gray. He often rubbed the surface with fine sandpaper to avoid the distraction of glare and remove any indication of brushmarks, along with all evidence of emotional expressiveness.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60472502"
],
"internet_archive": []
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "\u201cThe Year in Review for 1973.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 61, no. 2 (February 1974): 31\u201378.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 57; Mentioned: p. 77, no. 142",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152513"
},
{
"citation": "Diller, Burgoyne, Leon Polk Smith, and Edward B. Henning. \u201cTwo New Paintings in the Neo-Plastic Tradition.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 62, no. 4 (April 1975): 106\u2013119.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 107-108; Reproduced: Cover",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152584"
},
{
"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": "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. 66-67, no. 102",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1973.211",
"images": {},
"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 147478,
"creators": [
{
"id": 3426,
"description": "Burgoyne Diller (American, 1906\u20131965)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": null,
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1906",
"death_year": "1965",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1973-12-28T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1963,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "1963",
"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": [],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-05-01 06:50:46.266000"
}
}