Sam Gilliam, Leaf, 1970
One of Sam Gilliam’s “Drape” paintings, this one called Leaf from 1970, is one of the Dallas Museum of Art‘s first acquisitions under its new director Agustín Arteaga. The painting is acrylic on canvas and is deemed a major example of the artist’s work. The piece is currently on display in the museum’s Hanley Quadrant Gallery.
Via the DMA: “As the first work by Gilliam to enter the DMA’s collection, Leaf advances and complements the DMA’s holdings in postwar abstraction, particularly its collection of works related to the Washington Color School including Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland and Paul Reed… . Though the artist is often associated with the Washington Color School, which rejected gestural abstraction and embraced flat color planes, Gilliam eventually turned away from this approach in the late 1960s in favor of a freer application of color. This change took form in the artist’s iconic Beveled-edge and ‘Drape’ paintings, in which canvases are liberated from their stretchers and suspended from walls and ceilings, blurring the lines between painting and sculpture.”
The acquisition was initiated by DMA curator Gavin Delahunty, and the purchase was made possible by a gift from Timothy Headington. For more info, go here.
