id: 169583 accession number: 2011.403 share license status: Copyrighted url: https://clevelandart.org/art/2011.403 updated: 2024-03-26 02:01:29.366000 Moby Dick Dome Series: The Funeral (Dome), 1992. Frank Stella (American, b. 1936), Tyler Graphics Ltd.. Color etching, aquatint, relief, and engraving; framed: 186.7 x 134.6 x 15.2 cm (73 1/2 x 53 x 6 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Drs. Norman and Ann Roulet 2011.403 © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York title: Moby Dick Dome Series: The Funeral (Dome) title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 1992 creation date earliest: 1992 creation date latest: 1992 current location: creditline: Gift of Drs. Norman and Ann Roulet copyright: © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York --- culture: America, 20th century technique: color etching, aquatint, relief, and engraving department: Prints collection: Prints type: Print find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * Frank Stella (American, b. 1936) - artist Frank Stella was born in Malden, Massachusetts in 1936 and studied at Princeton University. Stella's auspicious start in New York, only a year after his graduation from Princeton, was an exhibit of the Black Paintings of 1959-60. Viewed as a precursor to Minimalism, these pivotal works led to his inclusion in Sixteen Americans at the Museum of Modern Art and the notice of its director, Alfred Barr, who purchased a painting, The Marriage of Squalor and Reason. With their emphasis on control and rationalism, the Black Paintings opened genuinely new paths for abstraction and exerted a profound influence on the art of the 1960s. A major shift from this work began to develop in 1966 with his Irregular Polygons, canvases in the shapes of irregular geometric forms and characterized by large unbroken areas of color. As this new vocabulary developed into a more open and color-oriented pictorial language, the works underwent a metamorphosis in size, expressing an affinity with architecture in their monumentality. Stella also introduced curves into his works, marking the beginning of the Protractor series. Harran II evinces the great vaulting compositions and lyrically decorative patterns that are the leitmotif of the series, which is based on the semicircular drafting instrument used for measuring and constructing angles. In the 1970s, Stella's work moved toward three-dimensional paintings on shaped canvases and later toward wall constructions with multiple components, ever projecting further from their supports. Stella's second retrospective at MOMA in 1987 concluded with a series of daring reliefs based on Melville's Moby Dick. These works further blurred any boundary between paintings and sculpture. In 1983-84 Stella gave the Charles Eliot Norton lectures at Harvard University. These lectures, later published under the title Working Space, marked a critical juncture for the artist. A spirited defense of abstraction, they could well sum up Stella's approach to painting and have acted as a manifesto for his work since. Since the 1980s, the artist has completed a number of large-scale works for public spaces, confirming Stella's abiding interest in architecture. A vast commission during the early 90s, involving the Princess of Wales Theater in Toronto, has led to a series of architectural proposals and commissions over the past eight years, including his Bandshell for the City of Miami. * Tyler Graphics Ltd. - published by --- measurements: Framed: 186.7 x 134.6 x 15.2 cm (73 1/2 x 53 x 6 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: description: White, shaped TGL handmade, hand-colored paper watermarks: inscriptions: inscription: Lower right, in pencil: "F. Stella '92 22/23" Lower right: embossed TGL, chop [hexagon] Verso, lower left, workshop number : FS87-901 translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS --- PROVENANCE G. W. Einstein Gallery, Inc., New York, October 14, 1992; Dr. and Mrs. Norman L. Roulet date: footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS --- IMAGES