Abstract Composition
Ernst is most closely associated with Dada and Surrealism: artistic and literary movements in Europe in the 1910s and 1920s that prized the irrational and the unconscious over order and reason. Among the techniques favored by these artists were ones that welcomed the hand of chance. This work demonstrates Ernst’s invention of grattage, in which he covered a canvas with a layer of pigment and scraped it with a palette knife to reveal imprints of objects placed underneath. Ernst continued to work this canvas, scraping the surface with a painter’s comb to reveal earlier paint layers and stamping new patterns atop the dried paint.
Artwork Details
- Title: Abstract Composition
- Artist: Max Ernst (French (born Germany), Brühl 1891–1976 Paris)
- Date: ca. 1927
- Medium: Oil paint on canvas, copper frame made by artist
- Dimensions: 14 × 11 in. (35.6 × 27.9 cm)
- Classification: Paintings
- Credit Line: Bequest of Nanette B. Kelekian, 2020
- Object Number: 2021.34.2
- Rights and Reproduction: © 2025 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
- Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art
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