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Primitives: Poems and Woodcuts

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Primitives: Poems and Woodcuts

Artist Max Weber (American, 1881-1961)
Author Max Weber (American, 1881-1961)
Date1926
Dimensionsbook: 10 3/8 x 6 1/4 in. (264 x 159mm)
page (untrimmed) A: 10 x 6 in. (254 x 153mm)
Page B: 9 3/4 x 12 in. (24.9 x 30.5 cm)
MediumOriginal prints: 11 woodcuts in brown ink (incl. 1 repeated on inserted prospectus), 1 linoleum cut in color Text: letterpress Paper: cream wove paper
ClassificationBooks
Credit LineMuseum Purchase
Object number
1979.44A-B
Not on View
Label TextWeber was born in Russia and emigrated to the United States with his family when he was 10 years old, eventually studying art at the Pratt Institute and then in Paris. There, from 1905 to 1909, he encountered new developments in European art, like the birth of Cubism. During the 1920s his work often paid homage to such European artists as Paul Cézanne, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, and Henri Rousseau, as well as to tribal African art. These influences are seen in his expressive style that abstracts and simplifies the human figure, as in this book of poetry that Weber both wrote and illustrated. The volume is a notable early example of an American artist-illustrated book.Published Referencescf. Philips, Elizabeth,The American Livre de Peintre, New York, The Grolier Club, 1993, no. 61. cf. Johnson, Robert Flynn, Artists' Books in the Modern Era 1870--2000: The Reva and David Logan Collection of Illustrated Books, San Francisco, 2001, no. 52. cf. Garvey, Eleanor M., The Artist & the Book, 1860--1960, Boston, 1961, no. 321Exhibition HistoryTMA Recent Acquisitions: Prints, Drawings, & llustrated Books Jan. 22, - June 24, 1983

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