{
"data": {
"id": 165693,
"accession_number": "2007.96",
"share_license_status": "Copyrighted",
"tombstone": "Mother Europe Cares for Her Colonies, 1925. L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Moholy-Nagy (American, 1895\u20131946). Gelatin silver print of a collage; image: 16.1 x 12.3 cm (6 5/16 x 4 13/16 in.); paper: 18.7 x 13.4 cm (7 3/8 x 5 1/4 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 2007.96. \u00a9 Estate of L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Moholy-Nagy / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Mother Europe Cares for Her Colonies",
"creation_date": "1925",
"creation_date_earliest": 1925,
"creation_date_latest": 1925,
"artists_tags": [
"Jewish artists",
"male"
],
"culture": [
"America"
],
"technique": "gelatin silver print of a collage",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Photography",
"collection": "PH - American 1900-1950",
"type": "Photograph",
"measurements": "Image: 16.1 x 12.3 cm (6 5/16 x 4 13/16 in.); Paper: 18.7 x 13.4 cm (7 3/8 x 5 1/4 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"image": {
"height": 0.161,
"height_inch": 6,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.3125,
"width": 0.123,
"width_inch": 4,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.8125
},
"paper": {
"height": 0.187,
"height_inch": 7,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.375,
"width": 0.134,
"width_inch": 5,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.25
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": "\u00a9 Estate of L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Moholy-Nagy / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York",
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "Written in pencil on verso: \"Moholy-Nagy/ (illegible word) mutter/europa/ (illegible word)/ (illegible word)/kolonien/foto/1925\"\r\n\r\n",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
},
{
"inscription": "Red rectangle and crop marks on verso of print, numbered in blue crayon: \"129\"",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
},
{
"inscription": "Artist's studio stamp on verso of print: \"moholy/nagy/berlin.../freidenrichstr. 27 atelier\"",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 335775,
"title": "Accommodations of Desire: Surrealist Works on Paper Collected by Julien Levy",
"description": "Accommodations of Desire: Surrealist Works on Paper Collected by Julien Levy. Palmer Museum of Art (September 14-December 5, 2004); McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College, MA (January 16-March 27, 2005); Crocker Art Museum, Sacaramento, CA (July 9-September 11, 2005); Portland Museum of Art (January 1-March 19, 2006).",
"opening_date": "2004-09-14T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 203169,
"title": "Forbidden Games: Surrealist and Modernist Photography",
"description": "Forbidden Games: Surrealist and Modernist Photography. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 19, 2014-January 11, 2015).",
"opening_date": "2014-10-19T00:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": []
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "Family of Otto Eisner, Brno, Czech Republic",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": null,
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "(Sotheby's, London, May 4, 2000, no. 161, sold to David Raymond)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "May 4, 2000",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "David Raymond [b.1979], New York, NY",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "2000-2007",
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "2007-",
"sortorder": 4
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": null,
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "For Moholy-Nagy, the densely packed variation of collage that he termed fotoplastik (photosculpture) comprising mounted fragments of photographs \"assembled on one plane . . . making for easier intelligibility, even revelation of an otherwise hidden meaning.\" He considered a fotoplastik finished only when seen in reproduction, such as the photograph here. This work is known under two titles, Birthmark Salome (Muttermal Salome) and Mother Europe Cares for Her Colonies. The latter is an overtly political reflection of anti-colonialist sentiments. Ironically, the picture shows two Africans, not a European. The washing of the child is indeed a caring act, although one he does not appear to appreciate.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q79995065"
],
"internet_archive": []
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art, Tom E. Hinson, Ian Walker, and Lisa Kurzner. Forbidden Games: Surrealist and Modernist Photography : the David Raymond Collection in the Cleveland Museum of Art. 2014.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 74; reproduced: p. 75; reproduced and mentioned: p. 228.",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Schaffner, Ingrid, Julien Levy, and Colin Westerbeck. Accommodations of Desire: Surrealist Works on Paper Collected by Julien Levy. Pasadena, Calif: Curatorial Assistance, Inc, 2004.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 80; mentioned: p. 123.",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Moholy-Nagy, L\u00e1szl\u00f3, Klemens Gruber, Oliver A. I. Botar, and Franti\u00e9sek Kalivoda. Telehor: mezin\u00e1rodn\u00ed casopis pro visu\u00e1ln\u00ed kulturu = Internationale Zeitschrift f\u00fcr visuelle Kultur = the international review new vision = revue internationale pour la culture visuelle. 2011.",
"page_number": "Reproduced and mentioned: p. 101.",
"url": null
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/2007.96",
"images": {},
"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "John L. Severance Fund",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 165693,
"creators": [
{
"id": 684,
"description": "L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Moholy-Nagy (American, 1895\u20131946)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": "L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Moholy-Nagy American, b. Austria-Hungary, 1895-1946 L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Moholy-Nagy was an avant-garde painter, photographer, filmmaker, writer, and stage and graphic designer known for his experimental approach. He was also an influential teacher and advocate of the \"new photography,\" the international movement that achieved prominence in Europe after World War I. Moholy-Nagy (born in B\u00e1csborsod) studied law at the University of Budapest (1914) and served in the Austro-Hungarian army during the war (1915-17). Wounded, he became interested in art during his convalescence and, although briefly resuming his law studies, decided to pursue a career in the arts. In late 1919 he moved to Vienna, then settled in Berlin, where he became associated with the dadaists and other avant-garde artists. He took part in his first exhibition in 1922 at the Berlin gallery Der Sturm, showing abstract paintings and metal sculpture. That same year he and his wife, Lucia Moholy, began investigating photograms (cameraless photographs) and over the next several years would continue to experiment, producing negative prints, photomontages, photocollages, and photographs taken from a variety of viewpoints and angles. In 1923 Walter Gropius invited Moholy-Nagy to head the metal workshop at the Bauhaus in Weimar. Moholy-Nagy also taught the school's introductory course and collaborated with his wife and Gropius to edit several volumes in the Bauhausb\u00fccher (Bauhaus Books) series. In 1925 he published his influential book Malerei, Photographie, Film (Painting, Photography, Film) and the following year completed his first film, Berliner Stilleben (Berlin Still Life). Moholy-Nagy left the Bauhaus in 1928 following the resignation of Gropius and moved to Berlin to work as a commercial artist, specializing in stage and graphic design, as well as in film. The following year he published Von Material zu Architektur (published in translation as The New Vision: From Material to Architecture, 1930) and helped organize Film und Foto, the well-known exhibition of avant-garde photography and film held in Stuttgart. He also exhibited more than 90 photographs in the show. Following his 1932 divorce and the Nazi rise to power in Germany, Moholy-Nagy immigrated to Amsterdam (1934) and then England (1935). He was invited to Chicago in 1937 to found the New Bauhaus (reorganized as the Chicago School of Design in 1939 and then renamed the Institute of Design in 1944). Moholy-Nagy directed the school until 1946, when he died of leukemia. M.M.",
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1895",
"death_year": "1946",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "2007-02-26T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1925,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "1925",
"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 06:52:48.149000"
}
}