[Seated woman with knees to chest]

1986.56.629
Medium
Support
Dimensions
23 13/16 x 17 7/8 in. (60.5 x 45.4 cm)
Estate/Inventory Number
R 7
Collection
National Gallery of Art, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.56.629. © Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko
Remarks
In January 1925 Rothko enrolled in a life-drawing class at the Art Students League of New York taught by George B. Bridgman (1865–1943). Rothko’s rendering of the hands in this drawing jibes with Bridgman’s theorization of hands in terms of their “four primal uses: weapon, scoop, book and tongs” [George B. Bridgman, Bridgman’s Life Drawing, 3rd ed. (New York, 1928), 157]. The proper left hand of Rothko’s woman, in particular, resembles Bridgman’s illustration of his caliperlike hand tongs (fig. 1).
[Seated woman with knees to chest]
1. “The Hand Tongs,” from Bridgman’s Life Drawing, 157.
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