Bertoia, Harry. UNTITLED MONOTYPE (American, 1915-1978). Ink on rice paper, circa 1970. Unique. Unsigned, Inscribed 453 in ink, lower right. 25 x 12 inches, framed to 30 x 16 inches. In excellent condition.
The
following is from the section on Monotypes on the website of the Bertoia
Foundation:
"Bertoia developed his own style of creating monographics
at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, and never worked with,
or even met, other printmakers. He would ink up a glass surface, place
rice paper on the glass, and then create designs with fingers or hand
tools from the backside of the paper. Each “print” is unique – never
reproductions of another – and there are thousands of them. When
Bertoia, looking for critique and direction, sent about 100 monotypes to
Hilla Rebay at the Guggenheim Museum of Non-Objective Art in 1943, he
was quite shocked when she asked to purchase the entire stock. He was up
half the night determining a fee, and finally set $1000 as his
compensation. When the subsequent Guggenheim show included many of his
prints, Bertoia’s name gained recognition. Bertoia loved the quickness
and spontaneity of the medium of his graphics. While sculptures took
weeks or months to produce, monotypes came to life in mere minutes. The
series of 50 monotypes reproduced in the Harry Bertoia Fifty Drawings
book “came into being in about twenty-four hours of uninterrupted work.”
Most, if not all, of Bertoia’s designs, whether they are chairs or
sculptures or tonals, were born on paper first. He started the monotypes
in 1939 and continued throughout his life."
