{
"data": {
"id": 173011,
"accession_number": "2017.127",
"share_license_status": "Copyrighted",
"tombstone": "Sea Painting I, 1973\u201374. Brice Marden (American, 1938\u20132023). Oil and wax on canvas; unframed: 182.8 x 137.2 cm (71 15/16 x 54 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Agnes Gund given in honor of the Cleveland Museum of Art\u2019s Centennial, 2017.127. \u00a9 Brice Marden / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Sea Painting I",
"creation_date": "1973\u201374",
"creation_date_earliest": 1973,
"creation_date_latest": 1974,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"America"
],
"technique": "oil and wax on canvas",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Contemporary Art",
"collection": "Paintings",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Unframed: 182.8 x 137.2 cm (71 15/16 x 54 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"unframed": {
"height": 1.828,
"height_inch": 71,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.9375,
"width": 1.372,
"width_inch": 54,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.0
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": "\u00a9 Brice Marden / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York",
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "Signed, titled, and dated 1973\u201374 on reverse of the top panel;",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"inscription": "titled and dated on the reverse of the bottom panel.",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"inscription": "Written in black marker (verso): \nTop Panel: \nSEA PAINTING I \n2 PANELS 36\" X 54\" EACH\n72\" X 54\"\n1973-74\nB. Marden",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"inscription": "Written in black marker (verso): \nBottom Panel: \n72\" X 54\" \n1973-74\nB. Marden",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": 4
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"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"
},
{
"id": 306886,
"title": "Recent Acquisitions",
"description": "Recent Acquisitions. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 17-June 7, 2018).",
"opening_date": "2018-03-17T04:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "New Paintings, Brice Marden. Bykert Gallery, New York, NY (March 23\u2013April 17, 1974)",
"opening_date": "1974-03-23T04:00:00Z"
},
{
"description": "Continuing Abstraction in American Art. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY [Downtown Branch] (September 19\u2013November 1, 1974)",
"opening_date": "1974-09-19T04:00:00Z"
},
{
"description": "A Selection of American Art: The Skowhegan School 1946\u20131976. Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA (June 16\u2013September 5, 1976; Colby Museum of Art, Waterville, ME, (October 1\u201330, 1976)",
"opening_date": "1976-06-16T04:00:00Z"
},
{
"description": "American Art in Belgium. Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, Belgium (May 25\u2013August 28, 1977)",
"opening_date": "1977-05-25T04:00:00Z"
},
{
"description": "Bilderstreit: Iconoclasm \u2013 Appeal, Unity and Fragment in Art Since 1960. The Rheinhallen, Cologne, Germany (April 8\u2013June 28, 1989)",
"opening_date": "1989-04-08T04:00:00Z"
},
{
"description": "In Quest of the Absolute. Blumarts Inc., New York, NY (April 6\u2013June 8, 1996)",
"opening_date": "1996-04-06T05:00:00Z"
},
{
"description": "The Persistence of Geometry: Form, Content and Culture in the Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. MOCA Cleveland, Cleveland, OH (June 9\u2013 August 20, 2006)",
"opening_date": "2006-06-09T04:00:00Z"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "Collection of the artist",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1973\u2013?",
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "Bykert Gallery, New York, NY",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [],
"date": "?",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "John Weber Gallery, New York, NY",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "?",
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"description": "Collection Parasol Press, New York, NY",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "?",
"sortorder": 4
},
{
"description": "Charles Kriwin, Brussels, BE",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "?",
"sortorder": 5
},
{
"description": "John Weber Gallery, New York, NY",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "?",
"sortorder": 6
},
{
"description": "Saatchi Collection",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "by 1984\u2013before 1991",
"sortorder": 7
},
{
"description": "Gagosian Gallery, New York, NY",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1990",
"sortorder": 8
},
{
"description": "(Sotheby\u2019s, New York, NY, Sale #6164, Contemporary Art Part I, April 30, 1991, Lot 30)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "April 30, 1991",
"sortorder": 9
},
{
"description": "Agnes Gund, New York, NY",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1991\u20132017",
"sortorder": 10
},
{
"description": "Agnes Gund, New York, NY, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "2017",
"sortorder": 11
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "2017\u2013",
"sortorder": 12
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [
"287.1993"
],
"did_you_know": "Later in his career, Marden dispensed with the wax technique used in Sea Painting I and developed a new method of mixing terpineol with oil to produce a pigment better suited to conveying the physicality of the canvas.",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "Brice Marden made his first monochromatic, single-panel painting in the winter of 1964. During the next 20 years, he created spare, abstract, often multipaneled paintings that won national acclaim. In Sea Painting I, two rectangular canvases were painted with a mixture of beeswax and oil\u2014known as encaustic\u2014creating a smooth, dense surface with a matte finish.
Marden tested the reductionist tendencies of Minimalism by reintroducing references to landscape into a seemingly abstract painting. Here, he used subtle tones of gray-green that suggest water and atmosphere. The sharp split of color alludes to the division between sky and ocean and a limitless view to the horizon.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60482570"
],
"internet_archive": []
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Ellenzweig, Allen. Selection of American Art: The Skowhegan School 1946\u20131976. Boston: Institute of Contemporary Art, 1976.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: P. 121",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Roque, Georges, Karel J. Geirlandt, and Monique Verken. American Art in Belgium: [Exhibit Held at Palais Des Beaux-Arts De Bruxelles 25.5-28.8.1977]. Bruxelles: Socie\u0301te\u0301 des expositions du Palais des beaux-arts, 1977.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced, P. 133, no. 95; p. 166 reproduced.",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Saatchi Collection, and Peter Schjeldahl. Art of Our Time: The Saatchi Collection, vol. 1. London: Lund Humphries, 1985.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 7; Reproduced: Pl. 70.",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Gohr, Siegfried, and Johannes Gachnang. Bilderstreit: Widerspruch, Einheit und Fragment in der Kunst seit 1960. Ko\u0308ln: DuMont, 1989.",
"page_number": "Catalogue No. 444; mentioned: p. 521",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Lewison, Jeremy, and Brice Marden. Brice Marden: Prints, 1961\u20131991 : a Catalogue Raisonne\u0301. London: Tate Gallery, 1992.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: P. 33",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Franz, Erich. In Quest of the Absolute. New York: Peter Blum, 1996.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced in color: p. 66\u201367.",
"url": ""
},
{
"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. 75, no. 110.",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Th\u00fcring, Reto and Liebert, Emily. \u201cAcquisition Highlights: Contemporary Art.\u201d Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 58, no. 2 (March/April 2018): 24-25.",
"page_number": "Reproduced and Mentioned: P. 24",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAMM2018-02/page/n11/mode/2up"
},
{
"citation": "Griswold, William M. \u201cRecent Acquisitions (2013-20) at the Cleveland Museum of Art.\u201d Burlington Magazine 163, no. 1414 (January 2021): 93\u2013104.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 101, no. 16; mentioned: P. 93",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/2017.127",
"images": {},
"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "Gift of Agnes Gund given in honor of the Cleveland Museum of Art\u2019s Centennial",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 173011,
"creators": [
{
"id": 9279,
"description": "Brice Marden (American, 1938\u20132023)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": null,
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1938",
"death_year": "2023",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "2017-09-11T00:00:00-04:00",
"sortable_date": 1973,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "1973\u201374",
"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 06:53:37.875000"
}
}