Author(s): Arshile Gorky (Artist); Parker Field (Text by); Pepe Karmel (Text by)

Art

Arshile Gorky (1904-1948) was an Armenian-American painter who was an important proponent of Abstract Expressionism.In 1946, Gorky spent the summer at a country estate in Lincoln, Virginia. In this time, he drew feverishly, producing almost 300 drawings.The drawings included a study for what is now considered one of his most remarkable paintings, The Limit (1947), a work that he described as the outcome of being "so lonely, exasperated, and how to paint such empty space--so empty it's the limit." Also among Gorky's artistic yield from the summer of 1946 were a group of related pieces that came to be referred to as the Virginia Summer drawings.During a 2020 conservation treatment on The Limit, conservators discovered that nested behind it was another work --an expressively painted canvas.This publication reveals this newly discovered painting and defines its place in the artist's oeuvre.Published with Hauser & Wirth.