Modern Art 1940–1980

On View: East Building, Upper Level

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78 artworks on view.

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This painting is a minimalistic composition, with three vertical lines in pale yellow or beige dividing a white canvas into three large rectangular sections. Lines in the same light color border the left and right edges of the canvas. The center of the canvas is a flat white color that appears to get slightly darker at the top and bottom of the canvas, fading into very light gray.

The Name II

Barnett Newman

1950

Magna and oil on canvas  Accession ID  1988.57.4

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E406
At first glance, this painting appears to be a completely empty white square. However, upon closer inspection, a series of pale gray horizontal lines become visible, forming a near-invisible grid pattern. The edges of the painting have a soft, uneven border of light brown.

Untitled

Robert Ryman

1965-1966

Oil on linen  Accession ID  2001.61.2

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E406
Tall, narrow, black building fronts fill this abstracted, horizontal painting. Partitions separating the buildings extend above the rooflines, and those, along with low domes atop some of the buildings, brush the top edge of the canvas. The narrow band of sky between the flat rooflines and the top of the composition is filled with cream-white paint, applied heavily in thick strokes. The buildings are painted with wide, horizontal strokes of black paint. The outlines of doors, windows, and the brick partitions between the buildings were incised into wet paint to delineate those features. Some of the outlines are also streaked with cobalt blue, butter yellow, brick red, and plum purple. Six people with oversized, round, peach-colored heads on spindly black bodies look out at us from windows across the composition. Cartoon-like eyes, noses, and smiling mouths are incised into wet paint. Along the bottom level, the buildings are numbered 78, 80, 82, and 84. Signs, also incised in wet, black paint to reveal white outlines, appear over the doors. The leftmost building reads “OPTICIEN” above “Leroy.” The next store is “PARFUMS,” then “MODES,” “Coiffeur,” “JOURNEAX,” “PRIMEURS,” and “BAR.” Under “PRIMEURS,” a sign on the store front reads “FRUITS ET LEGUMES.” Two people walk along the street, at the bottom of the canvas. One is to our left of center and stands facing us, smiling. The other is to our right, also smiling as he walks to our left in profile.

Façades d'immeubles (Building Façades)

Jean Dubuffet

1946

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1995.30.3

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407
The sculpture depicts a collection of pies arranged in a vertical stack inside a transparent display case. The case is made of a clear material with a metallic frame. Each pie is placed on a separate shelf within the unit, with one resting on the top of the case. The door to the case is ajar. The pies are round and placed in silver pie tins, and they are each decorated differently, with colors including golden-brown, white, yellow, red, and blue. The background is plain gray.

Glass Case with Pies (Assorted Pies in a Case)

Claes Oldenburg

1962

Burlap soaked in plaster, painted with enamel, with pie tins, in glass-and-metal case  Accession ID  1991.54.1

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407
The sculpture shows a tall, elongated figure made of stacked, rounded shapes tapering into a slender base. The rounded shapes look almost like lungs, and the shape at the top appears to have curving lines carved into it. The sculpture is created from a white material and stands upright on a metal square base.

Spring

Louise Bourgeois

1949

Painted wood  Accession ID  1992.102.3

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407

USA 41

Peter Voulkos

1960

Glazed stoneware and epoxy paint  Accession ID  2015.19.3905

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407
This painting is a full-length portrait of a man. He stands facing forward, with his hands on his hips. He has light brown skin with warm orange undertones and a short black mustache and beard, and his mouth is closed in a neutral expression. He has round glasses and a light blue hat or beanie over his head. He is wearing a denim jacket over a brown turtleneck shirt and denim pants with a wide black belt. The cuff of the jacket is visible on his left wrist. Over the denim, he wears a long black cape with a high collar that covers most of his arms. His feet are bare, and the one on the left is flexed upward while the one on the right is pointed down. The background is plain gray.

George Jules Taylor

Barkley L. Hendricks

1972

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1973.19.2

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E406
This nearly square, abstract painting is filled with circles within circles, like nested rings, each of a single bright color against the ivory white of the canvas. Each ring is made up of a series of short, rectangular dashes, and some bands are narrower while others are a bit wider. The majority of the rings are crimson and brick red, and they are interspersed with bands of lapis blue, army green, and pale pink. One of two pumpkin-orange bands is the smallest, innermost ring at the center. There is one aqua-blue colored ring just inside a pale, shell-white ring, which is the first to get cropped by the edges of the canvas. A few red, green, and blue rings beyond the white band are only seen at the corners of the canvas.

Pansies in Washington

Alma Thomas

1969

Acrylic on canvas  Accession ID  2015.19.144

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407
The image is a composition of rectangles and squares arranged in a grid-like pattern, filled with various abstract shapes and figures. The abstract imagery suggests forms resembling faces and elongated fish-like shapes, with a set of vertical lines resembling fingers or a hand. The arrangement and interplay of shapes give the appearance of a mosaic filled with symbolic references or hieroglyphs.

Pictograph

Adolph Gottlieb

1942

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  2002.101.1

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407
Painted entirely in shades of white, charcoal, and steel gray, a slim, white, almost ghostly dog makes its way from our left to right with its snout held low, along a sidewalk or rails in this vertical composition. The dog is thinly painted and blurry, as if shown in action, so the details are difficult to make out. The dark, gray space is defined only by three diagonals running from the center of the left edge down into the lower right corner. Within the band made by the lower two diagonals, two parallel sets of curving, parallel lines suggest grates or gutters over storm drains. Seeming unrelated to the rest of the image, three faint, gray, ruled lines radiate upward from a point near the lower-left corner to intersect the lowermost border defining the gutter.

Study of a Dog

Francis Bacon

1953

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1976.7.1

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407
An abstracted, nude person stands on a platform perched on two wheels, all cast in bronze, which balances on wooden blocks in this freestanding sculpture. The elongated, unnaturally thin woman stands with her arms slightly bent and held out to her sides. She has low-set breasts, and her blocky, oversized feet stand on a metal platform supported on two vertical strips of bronze that perch on the axle. The wheels are oversized with four spokes each arranged to look like Xs. The surface of the woman and wheels are rough and knubby, and all of the metal is colored gold. The wood blocks stand upright with channels cut into their upper surfaces to hold the wheels. The sculpture is angled to our left in this photograph, and it is shown against a pale gray background.

The Chariot

Alberto Giacometti

1950

Bronze  Accession ID  1977.47.2

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E407
This painting shows two people, a man and a woman, in a full-body view. The woman is standing on the left side, facing the right. Her left arm is bent, resting on a thin black railing behind her, and her hands are together by her waist. She has long blonde hair and pale skin, and she is wearing a colorful striped bikini with shades of blue, green, and purple. The man next to her is facing us, with his hands holding the railing behind him, wearing only light-colored denim shorts and a yellow belt. He has slightly tanner skin, a balding head, and a small patch of hair on his chest. Both individuals wear neutral expressions, and they are barefoot. The ground beneath them is composed of wooden planks. The background features green foliage and buildings with red brick walls and large glass windows. On the left, more buildings are partially visible, including one with a sign that reads "BEV STO" in the upper left corner.

Manhattan Landscape with Figures

Sylvia Sleigh

1968

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  2018.114.1

On View: East Building Upper Level, Gallery E406

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