Untitled (Abstract) 1950

Joan Grant made this intriguing abstract print, sometime in the mid-20th century. It looks like it was created by using multiple printing plates to lay down different blocks of color, one on top of the other. I feel for Joan, wrestling with the image, trying to pull together planes and angles, to create something new. Was she thinking about architecture, or the sea? Perhaps she began with a recognizable landscape, and then pushed it into abstraction. Check out the bold lines and the muted, earthy palette: greens, browns, a little bit of salmon pink. It reminds me a bit of early Synthetic Cubism with its fractured planes and multiple perspectives. I wonder if the darker marks were added last, after all the colors, to give it definition. It’s like a conversation between the artist and the materials, a give and take that gradually reveals an image. Whether she knew it or not, Grant was in dialogue with other artists, part of a long conversation that stretches across time, influencing and inspiring each other.