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Mountain Forms, New Mexico

A work made of watercolor with black crayon on moderately thick, moderately textured ivory wove paper (all edges trimmed), in original frame.
© 2018 Estate of John Marin / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

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  • A work made of watercolor with black crayon on moderately thick, moderately textured ivory wove paper (all edges trimmed), in original frame.

Date:

1930

Artist:

John Marin
American, 1870-1953

About this artwork

Marin’s interpretation of this landscape incorporates rectangles, circles, and triangles that take the image to the point of essential abstraction. The structure of the composition is severely flattened, the foreground marked by shrubs and the background by mountain peaks; sandwiched in between, are earth-colored geo-metric planes marked with dots and lines referencing fields and plant life. Drawing on the decorative vocabulary that he discovered in indigenous Southwestern pottery, blankets, and jewelry, Marin incorporated pyramids, triangles, and zigzag patterns to establish borders that hold his dynamic composition in check.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Prints and Drawings

Artist

John Marin

Title

Mountain Forms, New Mexico

Place

United States (Artist's nationality:)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

1930

Medium

Watercolor with black crayon on moderately thick, moderately textured ivory wove paper (all edges trimmed), in original frame

Inscriptions

Signed and dated lower right, in brown watercolor, over black crayon: ”Marin 30”

Dimensions

35 × 46 cm (13 13/16 × 18 1/8 in.)

Credit Line

Alfred Stieglitz Collection

Reference Number

1949.570

Copyright

© 2018 Estate of John Marin / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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