Untitled
Artist
Hofmann, Hans
(American, born Germany, 1882 - 1966)
Date1956
OriginUnited States of America
MediumOil on board
Dimensions10 × 11 in. (25.4 × 27.9 cm)
ClassificationsPainting
Credit LineCarolyn K. and Richard F. Barry III Art Purchase Fund
Object number2019.3
Label TextHans (Johann Georg Albert) Hofmann, (American, born Germany, 1880-1966)
Untitled
Oil on board, 1956
Carolyn K. and Richard F. Barry III Art Purchase Fund. 2019.3
German-born Hans Hofmann emerged as one of the most influential Abstract Expressionist painters of the 20th century. At age 16, he trained in Munich and Paris; his early work reflected the current European discourse of art encountered there, especially absorbing the ideas of Secessionism and Cubism. Hofmann moved permanently to New York in 1932, operating his own art school there and in the seasonal artist colony of Provincetown on Cape Cod. His first solo exhibition was late in life, held at Peggy Guggenheim's Art of This Century Gallery in New York in 1944. Although he did not join the controversial New York School of Artists represented by this gallery, Hofmann intellectually supported its circle of much younger founders, among them Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell, and Mark Rothko.
Hofmann was an intuitive painter, often using nature as his starting point. He emphasized the importance of understanding the unique capabilities of painting to achieve complex spacial depth with color, line, and form. In this vibrant abstract work from the artist's most expressive period, the accidental, spontaneous expression of poured and splattered paint is exploited.
Status
On view
