robert delaunay French, 1885–1941
Eiffel Tower 1924 Oil on canvas 7 2M × 68 5/* ( 184.2 × 174.3 cm) Gift of the Meadows Foundation, Incorporated, 1981.105
Robert Delaunay had a lifelong attraction to the Eiffel Tower. From his first painting of it in 1909 to his large canvas for the 1937 Paris Universal Exhibition, he chose the tower, with its soaring wrought-iron girders, as a symbol of modernity and as the perfect expression of an urban landscape. By taking a bird’s-eye view above the tower, he provokes the dizzying effects of great height and brilliant color.
fernand léger French, 1881–1955
The Divers (Red and Black) 1942 Oil on canvas 501/* × 581/* in. ( 127.3 × 147.6 cm) Foundation for the Arts Collection, gift of the James H. and Lillian Clark Foundation, 1982.29.FA
Fernand Léger developed his Divers series in the United States in the 1940s, after fleeing Nazi France. Inspired by the movements of swimmers, he attempted in these works “to translate the character of the human body evolving in space without any point of contact with the ground.” Léger attributed his separation of design and color to the neon signs he saw in New York.
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3121-04 DMA handbook Modern-Contemporary [BW 10-11].indd 278
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