Scanned by Kaitlin Vaughan from a slide. Color corrected by Pat Cagney.

Abstraction

Artist Blanche Lazzell (American, 1878-1956)

CultureAmerican

Date1924

MediumGouache on paper

DimensionsOverall, Frame: 18 3/8 x 15 3/8 in. (46.7 x 39.1 cm)
Overall: 12 3/4 x 9 1/2 in. (32.4 x 24.1 cm)

InscribedSigned and dated lower right: Blanche Lazzell, 1924

Credit LineMuseum purchase

Object number82.44

Collections

American Art before 1945

On View

Not on view

DescriptionThis is a gouache on paper painting of abstracted forms and architectural elements. The shapes are primarily curvy, with a stepped area near the center, leading to a doorway outlined in orange. The shapes used are overlapping and repeating; the colors utilized give a sense of the foreground, middle and background. The painting depicts a sophiscated arrangement of cubist theory using architectural forms.

Label TextBlanche Lazzell American, 1878–1956 Abstraction, 1924 Gouache on paper The American artist Blanche Lazzell perfected her Cubist style in 1923–24 in Paris, where she studied with leading French Cubists André Lhote and Albert Gleizes. Painted during that formative period, Abstraction offers a spare, tightly ordered arrangement of architectural elements: a doorway, stairs, and a patterned rug. The ease and fluency of abstract compositions like this one drew students to Lazzell in later years, when she worked and taught at the artist colony in Provincetown, Massachusetts. Museum purchase 82.44 ProvenanceWarren Cresswell, New York; Christie's, Manson & Woods, International, New York, Lot 120, Sale no. 5125, April 7, 1982; The Chrysler Museum at Norfolk purchase, 1982. Exhibition History"Behind the Seen: The Chrysler's Hidden Museum," Large Changing Gallery, Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Va., October 21, 2005 - February 19, 2006. "Women of the Chrysler: a 400-Year Celebration of the Arts," Large Changing Gallery, Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Va., March 24 - July 18, 2010. "Collection Conversations: Fractured Lens: Picasso, Braque, and Cubism’s Influence," Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA, October 14, 2014 - February 22, 2015.Published ReferencesMartha N. Hagood and Jefferson C. Harrison, _American Art at the Chrysler Museum: Selected Paintings, Sculpture, and Drawings_ (Norfolk, Va.: Chrysler Museum of Art, 2005), 165, no. 103. ISBN: 0-940744-71-6