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拍品专文
Chimera is an exquisite example from Gottlieb’s celebrated Pictograph series, in which the artist draws upon a number of complex signs and ciphers, arranging them in rich and subtle compositions to communicate language in its visual and primal form. Alongside friends Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman, Gottlieb was intrigued by ancient myths, and their ability to speak to people across times and cultures through the use of universal shapes to invoke the depths of human emotion. Here, the artist plucks a series of symbols, a smiling face, bowler hat, an exclamation mark, as well as sinuous, animalistic forms, and masterfully places each in a demarcated space. As it common with Gottlieb’s Pictographs towards the latter half of the decade, the boundaries are solidly marked, giving the appearance of codified language to be read or interpreted in a certain order. However, the work’s title suggests a different interpretation; a chimera is a fire-breathing she-monster from Greek mythology, cobbled together from a lion’s head, goat’s body and serpent’s tail. Gottlieb’s Pictographs were similarly inspired to take recognizable forms from nature and reassemble them into something otherworldly.
The unconscious power of Gottlieb’s chosen symbols skillfully manifest the artist's literary and cerebral practice, and reflect the intermingling in New York of the exiled Surrealists during World War II with the burgeoning Abstract Expressionist movement. Noted art critic Clement Greenberg wrote in the foreword to the Gottlieb retrospective organized by Bennington College in 1954: “Adolph Gottlieb is among the half-dozen artists responsible for the appearance since the 1940’s of the first body of American painting that can vie with, if not surpass, the best contemporary work in Europe. He is perhaps the most solidly accomplished painter of the group, the surest, if not the flashiest, hand” (C. Greenberg, “Foreword on program in connection with the Gottlieb Retrospective Show at Bennington College, April 23 – May 5, 1954” digitized by Bennington College Crossett Library).
The unconscious power of Gottlieb’s chosen symbols skillfully manifest the artist's literary and cerebral practice, and reflect the intermingling in New York of the exiled Surrealists during World War II with the burgeoning Abstract Expressionist movement. Noted art critic Clement Greenberg wrote in the foreword to the Gottlieb retrospective organized by Bennington College in 1954: “Adolph Gottlieb is among the half-dozen artists responsible for the appearance since the 1940’s of the first body of American painting that can vie with, if not surpass, the best contemporary work in Europe. He is perhaps the most solidly accomplished painter of the group, the surest, if not the flashiest, hand” (C. Greenberg, “Foreword on program in connection with the Gottlieb Retrospective Show at Bennington College, April 23 – May 5, 1954” digitized by Bennington College Crossett Library).