MoMA: Paul Klee and Others

The Museum of Modern Art reopened in fall of 2019 after expansion and renovation.  Here are a few of my highlights from the first visit after it reopened.


Vasudeo S. Gaitonde, 1962, Painting, 4.  Oil on canvas.

 "One of a group of Mumbai artists who synthesized traditional Indian approaches with Post-Impressionism, Cubism, and Expressionism, Gaitonde made Painting, 4 on a wet canvas with a roller and palette knife, creating a translucent golden ground that shifts to and from blue.  With no clear horizon, the almost symmetrical composition invites stillness and contemplation.  In this respect, it relates to Gaitonde's study of Zen Buddhism, an interest he discovered he shared with Mark Rothko after the two met in New York.  Zen, Gaitonde wrote, 'helped me to understand nature...my paintings are nothing else but the reflections of nature.  I want to say things in few words, I aim at directness and simplicity.'"

Ellsworth Kelly, 1951, Colors for a Large Wall.  Oil on canvas.

"At the time of its production in 1951, Colors for a Large Wall was the largest painting Kelly had ever made.  It brings together four strategies fundamental to modernism:  the additive composition of similar elements (each square is painted separately), the use of chance (each square is arranged randomly), the idea of the readymade (each color was taken from the French craft paper Kelly used to produce the collage on which the painting was based), and the allover grid of its composition.  The result is a painting in which no aspect of its appearance has been determined by the artist's personal choices."

Paul Klee, 1924, Actor's Mask.  Oil on canvas mounted on board.

Paul Klee, 1929, Fire in the Evening.  Oil on cardboard.

Kazimir Malevich, 1915, Suprematist Composition:  Airplane  Flying.