Artist
Antoni Tàpies (Spanish, 1923–2012)Spanish, 1923–2012
CultureSpanish
Titles
- Grey Relief with Oval
Date1963
Made inSpain
MediumOil and sand on canvas
Dimensions46 1/4 × 35 in. (117.5 × 88.9 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase
Object number64.2
Non exposé
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Department
Modern and Contemporary ArtObject Type
Antoni Tàpies combined his pigments with marble dust, resin, and other non-art materials to create rough, densely worked surfaces, a technique that he called pintura matèrica (material or “matter” painting). Gray Relief with Oval is one of a series of works that evoke the somber and weather-worn walls of the artist’s native Catalonia, which had borne witness to decades of hardship brought about by the Spanish Civil War and General Franco’s dictatorship (1936–75). Tàpies stated: “My walls . . . do not avoid their responsibility and hold their full archetypal or symbolic weight.”
ProvenanceThe artist; sold through [Martha Jackson Gallery, New York]; purchased by MFAH, 1963.
Exhibition History"Miro in America," Meadows Museum, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, April 20–June 27, 1982. (LN:82.12).
"Direction and Diversity: Twentieth Century Art in the Museum Collection,” The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, May 21–September 3, 1988.
"Art at Midcentury: Spotlight on the Collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston," The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, April 13–September 3, 2001.
"The Abstract Impulse: Selections from the Modern and Contemporary Collections," The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, February 3–May 5, 2013.
"Europe 1900-1975: Selections from the Museum's Collection," The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, March 4, 2014–January 4, 2015.
Cataloguing data may change with further research.
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