Marlow Moss

Composition in Yellow, Black and White

1949

In Tate St Ives

Modern Art and St Ives: Room 2

Artist: Marlow Moss 1889–1958
Medium: Oil paint and wood on canvas
Dimensions: Object: 508 × 356 × 6 mm
frame: 616 × 465 × 54 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by Miss Erica Brausen 1969
Reference: T01113

Display caption

Moss wrote, ‘I am no painter, I don’t see form, I only see space, movement and light’. Moss’s three-dimensional works, which she first made in white, relate to the structural grids popular in the Dutch art movement ‘De Stijl’ and the paintings of abstract artist Piet Mondrian. Here, two small black horizontal planes counterbalance a bright yellow section and a network of white lines that stand out from the canvas. Together these white, yellow and black elements interact to create a sense of movement and light.

Gallery label, April 2019

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Catalogue entry

Marlow Moss 1890–1958
T01113 COMPOSITION IN YELLOW, BLACK AND WHITE 1949
Inscribed ‘Marlow Moss. 49.’ on canvas on lower right side of stretcher.
Canvas, with strips of painted wood in relief, 20×14× 1/4 (51×35·5×1).
Presented by Miss Erica Brausen 1969.
Coll: Miss Erica Brausen since 1953.
Exh: Hanover Gallery, Nov.–Dec. 1953 (5).

From 1927 a disciple and from 1929 a friend of Mondrian, whom she saw frequently till 1938, Marlow Moss was closely concerned with Neo-Plasticist theory. Miss Brausen wrote (30 April 1969) that T1113 ‘was based on mathematical theory.’

Published in:
The Tate Gallery: Acquisitions 1968-9, London 1969