About This Artwork

Sam Francis
American, 1923–1994

In Lovely Blueness No. 2, 1955–56

Oil on linen
309.9 x 365.8 cm (122 x 144 in.), without frame
No known inscriptions
Mr. and Mrs. Frank G. Logan and Flora Mayer Witkowsky purchase prize funds; through prior gifts of Wallace L. DeWolf, Albert A. Munger and the Charles H. and Mary F. S. Worcester Collection; gift of Lannan Foundation, 1997.159

© 2008 Samuel L. Francis Foundation, California / ARS, New York.

In the mid 1950s, Sam Francis inaugurated a succession of monumentally scaled paintings informed by a variety of artistic sources, including Abstract Expressionism and French Impressionism. With their spontaneous brushwork and lyrical interplay of primary hues, these paintings established Francis as one of the foremost colorists of the postwar era. The artist often found inspiration in literary works and kept a notebook containing titles of books and verses. He named this and a related painting (In Lovely Blueness No. 1, 1955–57) after a poem by the German Romantic writer Friedrich Hölderlin, hoping to capture the poem’s sublime imagery and prophetic vision.

Exhibition, Publication and Ownership Histories

Exhibition History

San Francisco Museum of Art, “Paintings by Sam Francis, Wally Hedrick and Fred Martin; Sculpture by Wally Hedrick and Manuel Neri,” February 3–22, 1959; traveled to Pasadena Art Museum, March 3–April 10, 1959, and Seattle Art Museum, April 24–May 17, 1959, exh. pamphlet, cat. 3, as “In Lonely Blueness.”

Los Angeles, Lannan Foundation, “Abstraction II,” October 21, 1991–February 8, 1992, no cat.

Bonn, Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, “Sam Francis,” February 12–April 18, 1993, curated by Pontus Hulten; traveled to Los Angeles, Museum of Contemporary Art, October 24, 1993–January 9, 1994, p. 117 (color ill.).

Publication History

Yves Michaud, “Sam Francis, Paris années 50,” “Art Press” 170 (July/August 1988), p. 20.

“Sam Francis: les années parisiennes, 1950–1961,” exh. cat. (Paris: Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, 1995), pp. 29, 32, 178, 182, 193.

“Annual Report 1996–97” (Art Institute of Chicago, 1997), p. 15.

“Modern and Contemporary Art: The Lannan Collection at the Art Institute of Chicago,” “Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies” 25, 1 (1999), pp. 6, 16–17 (color ill.).

Ownership History

The artist, 1956–59; sold, Martha Jackson Gallery to J. Patrick Lannan, Palm Beach, 1959; given to the Lannan Foundation, 1961; partially sold and given to the Art Institute, 1997.