White Painting
White Painting is a rare work from the American Abstract Expressionist George Morrison’s "White Series." Produced between 1960 and 1970, this limited body of extant painting dates to the decade following the artist’s time in New York and Paris.
The highly nuanced aesthetic features present in White Painting include an applied undersurface of colored inflections beneath an impasto top layer of textured white paint. The scumbled creamy veneer and short energetic brushwork are indicative of Morrison’s heavy application style, a painting method for which he was known throughout his career. The artist’s affinity for opacity variation, layered texture, and thickly built-up surfaces are all equally evident. Morrison’s mathematical composition, indicated by organized lines across the canvas surface, demonstrates early signs of his popular "Horizon Series" – a group of works created in the mid-1980s for which he is most well-known.
The highly nuanced aesthetic features present in White Painting include an applied undersurface of colored inflections beneath an impasto top layer of textured white paint. The scumbled creamy veneer and short energetic brushwork are indicative of Morrison’s heavy application style, a painting method for which he was known throughout his career. The artist’s affinity for opacity variation, layered texture, and thickly built-up surfaces are all equally evident. Morrison’s mathematical composition, indicated by organized lines across the canvas surface, demonstrates early signs of his popular "Horizon Series" – a group of works created in the mid-1980s for which he is most well-known.
Artwork Details
- Title: White Painting
- Artist: George Morrison (Native American, Grand Portage Chippewa, 1919–2000)
- Date: 1965
- Culture: Ojibwe
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 15 × 21 in. (38.1 × 53.3 cm)
- Credit Line: Purchase, Lila Acheson Wallace Gift, 2022
- Object Number: 2022.353
- Rights and Reproduction: © George Morrison Estate
- Curatorial Department: The American Wing
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