Beschreibung:

Untitled
oil and gold leaf on canvas 11 7/8 x 11 7/8 in. (30.2 x 30.2 cm) Executed circa 1961.
Agnes’s New York Years In 1957, Martin moved from New Mexico to New York, financed in part with the help of Betty Parsons who first encountered the artist’s work a few years prior. In New York, Martin found residence just around the corner from Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg and forged close friendships with Ellsworth Kelly Ad Reinhardt and Barnett Newman all of whom had a considerable influence on her work. In these years, Martin’s work became increasingly geometric and abstract, culminating in paintings such as Untitled, circa 1961. Martin had three gallery exhibitions at Betty Parsons Gallery between 1958 and 1961, a testament to her growing popularity and engagement with the flourishing New York art scene. The years leading up to Untitled were undoubtedly some of her most formative, as she learned from her contemporaries and honed her signature Minimalist aesthetic. "Without awareness of beauty, innocence and happiness…one cannot make works of art." — Agnes Martin Ad Reinhardt Abstract Painting, Number 33, 1963. Whitney Museum of American Art/New York, Digital image © Whitney Museum of American Art / Licensed by Scala / Art Resource, NY, Artwork © 2020 Estate of Ad Reinhardt / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Though unquestionably influenced by the hard-edged, flat surfaces of Kelly and Reinhardt, Martin’s canvases retain an unmistakable intimacy and emotive power. She looked to female artists such as Lenore Tawney whose woven hanging “sculptures” provided a different point of reference for Martin. The effect of Tawney’s tactile, stitched surfaces is apparent in works such as Untitled, as Martin’s hand is distinctly visible in the tender, painted dots that lace the canvas. These dots are rendered with such care, that they in a sense bely the very essence of what her male counterparts were trying to achieve—the erasure of the artist’s hand. Martin’s painstaking, repetitive process—one that has been likened to weaving—is wholly visible in Untitled, where simplicity and intricacy coalesce. A Pivotal Moment Untitled belongs to a pivotal yet brief moment in the artist’s career, from 1958-1962, when she experimented with a diverse range of media, producing what are arguably some of her most unique and thought-provoking canvases. Emphasis on materiality takes center stage in these works, as evidenced by The Garden, from 1958, Des Moines Art Center's Louise Noun Collection of Art by Women, an assemblage composed of found materials such as debris, wood and knobs; Little Sister, 1962, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, incorporates Martin’s signature gridded canvas, but punctuated by physical nails which barely protrude from the surface. The culmination of a labor-intensive process applying oil, gold leaf, and likely rabbit skin glue on canvas, Untitled demonstrates Martin’s acute interest in materiality whilst simultaneously typifying her mature aesthetic: the square support, grid-like format, and flat surface. "An artist is fortunate in that his work is the inner contemplation of beauty, of perfection in life. We cannot make anything perfectly, but with inner contemplation of perfection, we can suggest it." — Agnes Martin Agnes Martin, Little Sister, 1962. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Photo credit The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation / Art Resource, NY Artwork © 2020 Estate of Agnes Martin / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Night Sea, 1963, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art was the last work in which Martin used gold leaf, and by 1964 she had abandoned her use of experimental media altogether in a move she associated with humility and restraint. She began using “humble” media such as graphite and colored pencil, applied directly to minimally prepared canvases, in an effort to “[collapse] the distinction between painting and drawing.”ii Thus, Untitled represents a fleeting yet powerful moment in the artist’s career, just as she had honed her mature style in New York, and before she would