Dora Maar
Untitled

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Artist Dora Maar (French, 1907–1997)French, 1907–1997

CultureFrench

Titles

Untitled

Date1935–1936

PlaceFrance

MediumGelatin silver print collage with applied color

DimensionsImage (Irregular): 15 11/16 × 11 11/16 in. (39.9 × 29.7 cm)
Sheet (Irregular): 15 11/16 × 11 11/16 in. (39.9 × 29.7 cm)
Mount: 15 3/4 × 11 3/4 in. (40 × 29.8 cm)
Frame: 22 11/16 × 18 11/16 × 1 1/8 in. (57.6 × 47.5 × 2.9 cm)

Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by the Caroline Wiess Law Accessions Endowment Fund

Object number97.83

Not on view

Explore Further

Department

Photography

Object Type

PHOTOGRAPHS

DescriptionIn
this Surrealist image, Dora Maar unites a Romanesque cloister from Mont St.
Michel (on the Normandy coast of France) and the figure of a dead woman,
identified as a corpse by the crucifix on her chest and the cap on her head,
used for tying closed the mouths of the dead. At the end of the cloister, Maar
added a stormy sky, transforming the arched passageway into a tunnel of death.

ProvenanceThe artist; Georges Bataille, 1936, d. 1962; Sylvie Bataille; purchased by The Collection Marvi, Monaco, August 1990; [purchased by Jill Quasha Gallery, New York, 1996]; purchased by MFAH, 1997.
Exhibition History"Modernism in a Century of Change: Cubism and the Heroic Years of Abstraction," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, October 1997–January 1998.

"Dora Maar - Pablo Picasso: A Dangerous Liaison," Haus der Kunst, Munich, October 12, 2001–January 13, 2002; Centre de la Vielle Charité, Marseille, France, February 7–April 30, 2002.

"Utopia/ Dystopia: Construction and Destruction in Photography and Collage," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, March 11–June 10, 2012.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks

The photograph is not signed or dated.

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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