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Untitled

1960
Not on view
Still’s rugged style of color-field painting invites comparison to landscape and recalls the painter’s early years living in the expansive terrain of North Dakota, Washington, and Alberta, Canada. This association applies especially to horizontally oriented compositions, such as this one, in which irregular craggy forms like mighty stalagmites and stalactites, mostly in black and deep red, evoke primordial forces. The artist accentuated the painting’s rocky character by building up areas of the surface with impasto (thick paint) using a palette knife. In 1979, the year before his death, The Met organized a survey of Still’s art—the largest presentation that had yet been organized on his work, and by the Museum on a living artist. In 1986 Still’s widow gave The Met ten paintings by her late husband.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Untitled
  • Artist: Clyfford Still (American, Grandin, North Dakota 1904–1980 Baltimore, Maryland)
  • Date: 1960
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 9 ft. 4 7/8 in. × 12 ft. 2 1/4 in. (286.7 × 371.5 cm)
  • Classification: Paintings
  • Credit Line: Gift of Mrs. Clyfford Still, 1986
  • Object Number: 1986.441.7
  • Rights and Reproduction: © 2025 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
  • Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art

More Artwork

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Untitled, Clyfford Still American, Oil on canvas
Untitled
Clyfford Still
1950
1950-W, Clyfford Still American, Oil on canvas
1950-W
Clyfford Still
1950
Untitled, Clyfford Still American, Oil on canvas
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Clyfford Still
1977
Untitled, Clyfford Still American, Oil on canvas
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1946–47
1950-E, Clyfford Still American, Oil on canvas
1950-E
Clyfford Still
1950

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