Untitled
Artist
Saul Steinberg
(American, born Romania, 1914 - 1999)
Date1968
MediumInk, watercolor, crayon, rubber stamps, pencil, and airmail envelope collage on J. Whatman handmade paper
DimensionsSheet: 19 1/4 × 24 inches (48.9 × 60.96 cm)
Image: 18 3/8 × 23 1/4 inches (46.67 × 59.06 cm)
Image: 18 3/8 × 23 1/4 inches (46.67 × 59.06 cm)
Credit LineGift of The Saul Steinberg Foundation
Object number2019.49.10
On View
Not on viewCollections
Exhibition History"A Way of Reasoning on Paper," The Art of Saul Steinberg, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri. April 18 - December 3, 2023.
One of the many styles Steinberg adapted for his art was Cubism, especially for its embrace of collage and ability to present objects from multiple perspectives. Here, an airmail envelope, opened, flattened, and pasted at the center of this drawing, plays hide and seek with us. Cleverly blurring the lines between actual object and artifice, Steinberg extended the envelope's diagonal red-and-blue stripes with watercolor. Steinberg's father was a manufacturer of commercial decorative boxes, which ensured him ample opportunities to cut and paste paper as a child.
Copyright© The Saul Steinberg Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
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