Composition

Composition

Year: 1939
Type: Painting

Catalog #: SF_1207

Current Location:
Berkshire Museum

Dimensions:
12 x 26 3/4

AE Gallatin won this painting in a raffle held to raise money for the AAA artists Albert Swinden and Balcomb Greene, whose adjoining studios burned in a fire (Tufts Catalog, 23). Slobodkina recalls: “Obviously, one of us chose his best work as his contribution. I remember mine was a tall, narrow piece in pale, ‘refined’ tones I affected in that period. It wasn’t a bad painting but it had a hideous, flimsy, overly ornate frame which I painted white to minimize its garishness. As luck would have it, Mr. Gallatin won this work of dubious merit. I was both pleased and aghast at the thought of that picture joining the famous Gallatin Collection at the Museum of Living Art” (Autobiography, Vol. II, p.611).