Pi

Artist Morris Louis American, 1912–1962

Date1960

MediumAcrylic on canvas

Dimensions103 x 175 in. (261.6 x 444.5 cm)
Frame: 104 x 176 x 2 1/8 in. (264.2 x 447 x 5.4 cm)

ClassificationsPaintings

Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. Gordon Hanes

Object number82.15

On View

Not on view

Label TextColor field painting, which appeared in the late 1950s and prevailed in the art world into the 1960s and 1970s, was pioneered by Helen Frankenthaler and followed by artists including Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland, Sam Gilliam, and many others. Focusing on large expanses or fields of color spread, poured, stained, or sprayed onto raw canvas, and emphasizing overall form and color (versus expressive action and brushwork), color field painting was considered by its proponents to be a more “pure” form of abstraction.

Pi is one of the earliest of Morris Louis’s Unfurleds, a series of 150 monumental paintings, each characterized by symmetrical banks of streaming color separated by an empty expanse of white. Working within a cramped studio, the artist pleated and tacked large spans of cotton canvas to a wooden stretcher and then poured dilute paint down the pleats, tilting the stretcher to further guide the course of the liquid. Paint soaked the fabric, like watercolor into paper.ProvenanceCreated Washington, D.C., 1960; collection of the artist; estate of the artist, 1962; [André Emmerich Gallery, New York]; [David Mirvish Gallery, Toronto, 1969]; Fred Mueller (co-owner of Pace Gallery), New York; [Pace Gallery, New York]; [André Emmerich Gallery, New York]; Gordon Hanes, Winston-Salem, NC, 1980; given to NCMA, 1982.Published ReferencesMorris Louis, 1912-1962 (exhibition catalogue) (Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1967), illus. (b-w) 60.

Barbara Plumb, "The Elite Meet." New York Times Magazine (December 21,1969), 44-45, illus. (b-w) 45.

Michael Fried, Morris Louis (New York: Abrams, 1970), discussed 34, illus. (color) pl. 107.

"Space-and-light: The New York apartment of Fred Mueller," Vogue 157 (February 1, 1971), 174-175, illus. (color, as part of interior decor) 175.

Jean Christoph, "Wohnen mit Kunst," Architektur & Wohnen [ ] (January 1976), 86-95, illus. (color) 94-95.

Edgar Peters Bowron, ed., Introduction to the Collections (Chapel Hill: published for the North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh, by The University of North Carolina Press, 1983), illus. (color) 31.

Diane Upright, Morris Louis: The Complete Paintings (New York: Abrams, 1985), no. 355, illus. (color) p. 107.

Introduction to the Collections, rev. ed. (Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1992), illus. (color) 275.

John W. Coffey and Virginia Burden, entry for Pi, in North Carolina Museum of Art: Handbook of the Collections, Rebecca Martin Nagy, ed. (Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 1998), 230, illus. (color).

Robert Rosenblum, On Modern American Art: Selected Essays by Robert Rosenblum (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1999), illus. (b-w) 134.

John W. Coffey, entry for Pi, in North Carolina Museum of Art: Handbook of the Collections, rev. ed. (Raleigh: North Carolina Museum of Art, 2010), 488, illus. (color) 489.
Exhibition HistoryLos Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, "Morris Louis, 1912-1962," February 15-March 26, 1967; Boston, MA, Museum of Fine Arts, April 13-May 24, 1967; St. Louis, MO, City Art Museum of St. Louis, illus. (b-w) 60 (as collection of André Emmerich Gallery).
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