The Collected Writings of Robert Motherwell

by Motherwell, Robert; Terenzio, Stephanie

• ISBN13: 9780520221796
• ISBN10: 0520221796
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-11-01
• Publisher: Univ of California Pr

Summary

This collection shows how, as a painter, a lecturer, and editor of a series of pioneering books on modern art, Motherwell was influential in both illuminating and shaping the development of what he termed "the enterprise" of abstract art.

Table of Contents

Chronology	xvii
Introduction	3	(12)
ONE 1941--1949
Letter to William Carlos Williams (3 December 1941)	15	(4)
``Notes on Mondrian and Chirico'' (June 1942)	19	(3)
``Painters' Objects'' (January 1944)	22	(5)
``The Modern Painter's World'' (10 August 1944)	27	(8)
``Beyond the Aesthetic'' (April 1946)	35	(4)
Statement in Fourteen Americans (1946)	39	(1)
Letter to Samuel Kootz (21 January 1947)	40	(2)
Statement in Motherwell (1947)	42	(1)
Letter to Christian Zervos (13 June 1947)	43	(1)
Editorial Preface to possibilities 1 (Winter 1947/1948)	44	(3)
Prefatory Note to Max Ernst: Beyond Painting and Other Writings by the Artist and His Friends (1948)	47	(2)
Prefatory Note to Jean (Hans) Arp, On My Way: Poetry and Essays 1912--1947 (1948)	49	(2)
``A Tour of the Sublime'' (15 December 1948)	51	(3)
Preliminary Notice to Daniel--Henry Kahnweiler, The Rise of Cubism (1949)	54	(2)
``A Personal Expression'' (19 March 1949)	56	(7)
Preliminary Notice to Guillaume Apollinaire, The Cubist Painters: Aesthetic Meditations 1913 (1949)	63	(2)
``Reflections on Painting Now'' (11 August 1949)	65	(4)
Preliminary Notice to Marcel Raymond, From Baudelaire to Surrealism (1949)	69	(2)
TWO 1950--1959
``Black or White'' (1950)	71	(1)
Preface to Georges Duthuit, the Fauvist Painters (1950)	72	(4)
``The New York School'' (27 October 1950)	76	(6)
Preface [``The School of New York''] to Seventeen Modern American Painters (1951)	82	(2)
``What Abstract Art Means to Me'' (5 February 1951)	84	(3)
``The Rise and Continuity of Abstract Art'' (12 April 1951)	87	(2)
Preface to The Dada Painters and Poets: An Anthology (1951)	89	(4)
A Statement and an Introduction to the Illustrations in Modern Artists in America: First Series (1951)	93	(3)
Final Page of Letter to Unknown Party (Early 1952)	96	(2)
``Symbolism'' (24 February 1954)	98	(6)
``The Painter and the Audience'' (Fall 1954)	104	(4)
``A Painting Must Make Human Contact'' (1955)	108	(1)
Letter to John (10 November 1956)	109	(3)
Notes in John I. H. Baur, Bradley Walker Tomlin (1957)	112	(2)
``The Significance of Miro'' (May 1959)	114	(7)
Lecture with Charles R. Hulbeck (October 1959)	121	(4)
Occasional Pieces (ca. 1950s)	125	(4)
THREE 1960--1969
``What Should a Museum Be?'' (March 1961)	129	(3)
``Homage to Franz Kline'' (17 August 1962)	132	(2)
``Robert Motherwell: A Conversation at Lunch'' (November 1962)	134	(4)
``A Process of Painting'' (5 October 1963)	138	(3)
Interview with Bryan Robertson, Addenda (1965)	141	(6)
``Letter from Robert Motherwell to Frank O'Hara, Dated August 18,1965''	147	(8)
Interview with Sidney Simon: ``Concerning the Beginnings of the New York School: 1939--1943'' (January 1967)	155	(13)
Letters to Emerson Woelffer (26 August 1968 and 12 February 1969)	168	(2)
``Addenda to The Museum of Modern Art Lyric Suite Questionnaire---From Memory ... with Possible Chronological Slips'' (Fall 1969)	170	(5)
FOUR 1970--1979
``On the Humanism of Abstraction'' (6 February 1970)	175	(6)
Letter to Irving Sandler (23 February 1970)	181	(2)
Testimony Before the Select Subcommittee on Education (24 March 1970)	183	(4)
``The Universal Language of Children's Art, and Modernism'' (29 April 1970)	187	(5)
``Thoughts on Drawing'' (1970)	192	(3)
On Rothko (10 March 1967, 21 April 1969, and 28 January 1971)	195	(6)
On David Smith (9 April 1971)	201	(4)
Introduction to Pierre Cabanne, Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp (1971)	205	(5)
``The Book's Beginnings'' (1972)	210	(4)
Interview with Richard Wagener (14 June 1974)	214	(7)
Letter to Lynda Hartigan (15 November 1977)	221	(2)
``Provincetown and Days Lumberyard: A Memoir'' (1978)	223	(4)
Excerpt from ``A Conversation with Students'' (6 April 1979)	227	(1)
Two Letters on Surrealism (18 October 1978 and 15 May 1979)	228	(6)
``The International World of Modernist Art: 1945--1960'' (May 1979)	234	(3)
FIVE 1980--1988
Letter to Yve-Alain Bois (13 October 1980)	237	(4)
Letter to Guy Scarpetta (8 June 1981)	241	(4)
``In Memoriam: Anthony Smith'' (19 October 1981)	245	(1)
Letter to Virginia Dorazio (26 January 1982)	246	(3)
Letter to Bruce Grenville (4 February 1982)	249	(2)
Letter to Ann Louise Coffin McLaughlin (29 September 1982)	251	(2)
Foreword to William C. Seitz, Abstract Expressionist Painting in America (1983)	253	(5)
``Remarks'' (30 October 1982)	258	(4)
``Kafka's Visual Recoil: A Note'' (19 March 1983)	262	(4)
``A Collage for Nathan Halper in Nine Parts''' (12 August 1983)	266	(3)
Letter to Glen MacLeod (21 September 1983)	269	(2)
Letter to Jack Beatty (6 October 1983)	271	(1)
Letter to Christian Leprette (5 August 1984)	272	(4)
``Animating Rhythm'' (October 1984)	276	(2)
``On Not Becoming an Academic'' (4 September 1986)	278	(2)
``Introduction for Octavio Paz'' (4 October 1987)	280	(2)
Interview with David Hayman (12 and 13 July 1988)	282	(7)
Letter to Ted Lindberg (19 October 1988)	289	(4)
Appendix A Prospectus for The Documents of Modern Art	293	(1)
Appendix B Catalog (1948--49) for The Subjects of the Artist	294	(2)
Appendix C Prospectus for Modern Artists in America	296	(2)
Appendix D Motherwell's Course Syllabus, Hunter College (Fall 1955)	298	(3)
Bibliography	301	(26)
Index	327