Composition

Provenance

The artist
To (Robert Schoelkopf Gallery, New York, by 1970) [Schoelkopf represented Matulka and after 1972, represented the Matulka estate]

To Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Armstrong, 1972

Estate of Thomas and Whitney Armstrong, 2011

Exhibited

(probably) New York, Rehn Gallery, Jan Matulka, April 1930. See review, Carlyle Burrows, “News and Exhibitions of the Week in Art,” New York Herald Tribune, April 13, 1930, p. G10.

(probably) New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Abstract Painting in America, February 12–March 22, 1935, no. 77 (as Composition, Collection of the Frank K. M. Rehn Gallery, New York).

New York, Robert Schoelkopf Gallery, Jan Matulka, October 24–November 19, 1970, no. 24 (Composition, oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches).

New York, Robert Schoelkopf Gallery, Jan Matulka, April 1–20, 1972, no. 33 (as Still Life with Gramophone, oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches)

(probably) Nashville, Tennessee, Tennessee Botanical Gardens and Fine Arts Center—Cheekwood, Jan Matulka, November 1972.

New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Jan Matulka, December 18, 1979–February 24, 1980 (dates work 1927). Traveled to the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, April 3 – June 1, 1980 ; the Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, June 15 – October 1, 1980 ; and the National Collection of Fine Arts, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, November 21, 1980 – February 8, 1981. With text by Patterson Sims, Merry A. Foresta, Dorothy Dehner, and Janet A. Flint.

Ithaca, New York, Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Cornell Collects: A Celebration of American Art from the Collections of Alumni and Friends, August 21–November 4, 1990 (dates work 1927).

New York, Berry-Hill Gallery, Toward a New American Cubism, May 16–July 7, 2006 (dates work ca. 1930).

Andover, Massachusetts, Addison Gallery of American Art, American Vanguards: Graham, Davis, Gorky, de Kooning, and Their Circle; September 21–December 30, 2012; traveled to Fort Worth, Texas, Amon Carter Museum of American Art, June 9–August 19, 2012.

Literature

(probably) Carlyle Burrows, “News and Exhibitions of the Week in Art,” New York Herald Tribune, April 13, 1930, p. G10.

Hilton Kramer, “The Pictorial Styles of Jan Matulka,” New York Times, October 31, 1970, p. 25.

Jan Matulka et al, Jan Matulka, 1890–1972, exh. cat. (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1979).

William C. Agee, Irving Sandler, and Karen Wilkin, American Vanguards: Graham, Davis, Gorky, de Kooning, and Their Circle, exh. cat. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2011).

“Arts Spotlight: New ‘American Vanguards’ Exhibit at the Amon Carter Museum, Dallas Morning News, June 7, 2012, illustrated

Charissa N. Terranova, “The Modernist Musketeers,” Arts and Culture, Texas, May 2, 2012