Composition with Winch
Dateca. 1932
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions22 x 27 in. (55.9 x 68.6 cm)
Framed: 24 x 29 in. (61 x 73.7 cm)
ClassificationsPainting
Credit LinePromised Gift to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas
Signedl.r.: Stuart Davis
Label Text“In looking at a picture one does not see the familiar, the already known … one sees a new subject, a new experience,” wrote Stuart Davis in his journal. Composition with Winch reveals how the artist experimented with abstraction to pursue a new way of painting. Based on observations of the working harbor in Gloucester, Massachusetts, Davis translated the ropes and rigging of the port into a maze of thick black lines. The dynamic geometry provided a new visual vocabulary that Davis believed could best express contemporary experience.
