Rex | Harvard Art Museums

Gallery Text

Frankenthaler came to prominence in the early 1950s for her innovative approach to painting: she would apply thinned oils to unprimed canvas so that the pigment would seep into the surface and create pools and fields of color. By the 1980s, when she made Rex, she had switched to acrylic paints, which introduced brighter, more saturated hues and concentrated color. With acrylic, she built up layers of paint using her brush to manip-ulate the liquid pools or, with thicker paint, add linear gestures to punctuate the visual field. Rex is part of a group of vertical paintings Frankenthaler made in 1987, a period in which she was also working intensively on complex woodcut prints employing Japanese techniques she learned during a trip to the country years before. The vertical format of panels in Japanese screens and scrolls may have influenced this choice as well.

Identification and Creation

Object Number: 2003.51
People: Helen Frankenthaler, American (New York NY 1928 - 2011 Darien, Connecticut)
Title: Rex
Classification: Paintings
Work Type: painting
Date: 1987
Culture: American
Persistent Link: https://hvrd.art/o/50618

Location

Location: Level 1, Room 1200, Modern and Contemporary Art, Gesture

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Physical Descriptions

Medium

Acrylic paint on canvas

Dimensions

265.43 x 127.64 cm (104 1/2 x 50 1/4 in.)

Inscriptions and Marks

Signed: l.r. in black paint
inscription: back of canvas, red pencil: "Rex" / a/c 1987 / 104 1/2 x 50 1/4 / 8' 8 1/2" x 4' 2 1/4"
label: upper stretcher bar: Andre Emmerich Gallery
44 E 57
New York 10022
Helen Frankenthaler
Rex, 1987
Acrylic on Canvas
104 1/2 x 50 1/4"
label: lower stretcher bar: [Irving Galleries label:] Irving Galleries/ 332 Worth Ave., Palm Beach Fla., 33480 USA /Artist Helen Frankenthaler / "Rex" / [Mediu]m Acrylic [label torn off] / [torn off] dated on reverse, also [torn off] / [torn off]ght / [torn off] in. x 4 ft. 4 in. / FH - 6 [torn off]
stamp: stretcher: Andre Emmerich Galleries stamp

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History: Herbert and Mildred Lee, Boston, Massachusetts, gift; to Harvard University Art Museums, 2003.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line: Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Herbert C. Lee
Accession Year: 2003
Object Number: 2003.51
Division: Modern and Contemporary Art
Contact: am_moderncontemporary@harvard.edu
Permissions: The Harvard Art Museums encourage the use of images found on this website for personal, noncommercial use, including educational and scholarly purposes. To request a higher resolution file of this image, please submit an online request.

Descriptions

Description: A tall (vertically oriented) acrylic on canvas. The background is a warm orange-yellow, soaked into the canvas, with areas of overpainting in red. The red is sometimes thin and wash-like, sometimes thicker and more opaque, with some impasto. A purple vertical strip runs down the edge of the central red area, and an orange zigzag "crown" and yellow profile are at the upper portion of the canvas.

Exhibition History

32Q: 1110 , Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 10/23/2023 - 04/07/2025
32Q: 1200 Gesture, Harvard Art Museums, 08/11/2025 - 01/01/2050

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Modern and Contemporary Art at am_moderncontemporary@harvard.edu

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2003.51: Rex