Untitled from Unité
Le Corbusier (Charles-Édouard Jeanneret)
French, born Switzerland. 1887–1965
1963–65
A color etching from Le Corbusier’s Unité portfolio in which the architect-artist translates his interest in structure and archetype into stacked, bull-like figures rendered with rough, expressive line and flat areas of color.
You first notice two stylized bovine heads arranged like a totem—thick black outlines, sketchy hatch marks and bold slabs of red, green and ochre combine to feel at once playful, primitive and architectonic.
Executed late in his career, this print shows how Le Corbusier carried his architectural concerns—order, modularity and archetypal form—into printmaking, helping to broaden modernism into a cross-disciplinary visual language.
Medium
One from a portfolio of twenty etchings
Dimensions
plate: 16 7/16 x 12 1/2" (41.8 x 31.8 cm); sheet: 22 1/2 x 17 15/16" (57.1 x 45.5 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Fund
Accession
289.1966.19
Palette
Exhibitions
