Composition

Jean Hélion

Brooklyn Museum photograph

Object Label

This canvas dates from around the time that Jean Hélion, a leading proponent of abstraction in the 1930s, began to coalesce his arrangements of colored shapes and gradated volumes into more explicitly figurative representations. Composition evokes some of the subjects that would soon preoccupy him: bust-length, suited men wearing brimmed hats, viewed from the front, back, or in profile. Hélion said of his figural and abstract pictorial modes: “They are the same thing, or nearly. Planes, volumes, spaces. Strong colors, fine tones, the rhythms of all nature. You can even, if you like, mix my figures and my abstractions

Caption

Jean Hélion Couterne, France, 1904 – 1987, Paris, France. Composition, 1939. Oil on masonite, 15 x 11 in. (38.1 x 27.9 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Lucile E. Selz, 1991.283.2. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 1991.283.2_PS9.jpg)

Gallery

Not on view

Collection

European Art

Title

Composition

Date

1939

Geography

Place made: France

Medium

Oil on masonite

Classification

Painting

Dimensions

15 x 11 in. (38.1 x 27.9 cm)

Inscriptions

Verso: "HAUT/Hélion/17 Jan. 39/(Va)"

Credit Line

Gift of Lucile E. Selz

Accession Number

1991.283.2

Rights

© artist or artist's estate

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