La racine noire (The Black Root), Fernand Léger

Artwork Overview

Fernand Léger, La racine noire (The Black Root)
Fernand Léger, La racine noire (The Black Root)
Fernand Léger
La racine noire (The Black Root)
1948
Fernand Léger
1881–1955
La racine noire (The Black Root), 1948
Where object was made: France
Material/technique: Arches® paper; color lithograph
Dimensions:
Image Dimensions Height/Width (Height x Width): 370 x 461 mm
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 472 x 598 mm
Image Dimensions Height/Width (Height x Width): 14 9/16 x 18 1/8 in
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 18 9/16 x 23 9/16 in
Mat Dimensions (Height x Width): 20 x 25 in
Credit line: Gift from the John J. Talleur and Ann Talleur Collection
Accession number: 1991.0277
Not on display
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Archive Label 2003: Fernand Léger developed his Cubist-derived abstractions in the 1910s, influenced by the early modernists working in Paris. World War I saw the artist drafted into the French army in 1914 and gassed at Verdun in 1916. During his service, he constantly made drawings of fellow soldiers working with the industrial war machines, which directly influenced his post-war mechanized imagery combined with the ideal of the common man that he pictured throughout the 1920s, and again in the 1950s. Under threat of occupation at the dawn of World War II, Léger moved from Paris first to rural Normandy, and then in 1940 to the United States. He was entranced by the lights and colors of New York City, producing an enormous number of paintings during his exile in the States. He taught at Yale and traveled the country. But as soon as the war was over, the artist returned to France, taking an active role in the Communist Party and the World Peace Movement. Although not primarily a printmaker, Léger was dedicated to the use of pure color and form in all his work, as seen in this lithograph from post-war years.