Homage to the Square: Dissolving/vanishing
1951
Oil on Masonite
24 x 24 in. (61 x 61 cm)
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Gift of the Anni Albers and the Josef Albers Foundation, Inc.
Josef Albers discovered his signature motif in 1950, when he was sixty-two years old. Over the next twenty-five years he methodically produced more than one thousand works in the Homage to the Square series, which he called "platters for color." Rather than mixing paint, he used pigments directly from the tube. In these works Albers explored an illusion whereby the central square, lying between the inner and outer squares, would subtly take on the hue of its neighbors. He termed this the "interaction of color." This effect may be not be evident when the work is seen in reproduction, but most important to Albers—the mood of the work should be evident. This particular painting seems light-filled and optimistic, proposing spiritual and philosophical reflection.
