Artist-in-Residence

Louise Nevelson

Louise Nevelson, "Opera Costume", 1985
Louise Nevelson, in collaboration with The Fabric Workshop and Museum, Philadelphia. Opera Costume, 1985. Pigment on cotton twill, 67 x 69 inches (170.18 x 175.26 cm). Edition of 40. Commissioned by the Opera Theatre of St. Louis' production of Orfeo ed Euridice. Photo credit: Aaron Igler.Reference number: 61545.

Louise Nevelson’s early artistic training included study in the performing as well as visual arts. During her residency at FWM, Nevelson turned her attention to the design of opera costumes, a project commissioned by the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis for the 1984 production of Orfeo ed Euridice. Nevelson’s commission also involved the creation of the set design, and marked her first time designing for the stage. She described the set in 1984:

The columns are independent, symbols of male and female, one different from the other. They will be onstage the whole time and the dancing will be around them. We are bordering on surrealism with some of this; instead of Orfeo holding a lyre symbolically I decided we’d just have a thin wire and fly it. It’s not played—nothing touches it.

To create the edition of forty costumes, Nevelson utilized the silkscreen printing process, drawing on motifs from earlier prints and drawings. The background is printed with marbled grey tones—randomized so that no two costumes are alike— with abstracted black patterning on top. The costumes are bold and sculptural in their form, and graphically draw on the same muted tones and dark color that define her well-known three-dimensional work. The element of shadow, which Nevelson called the “fourth-dimension,” is clear in the patterning of the costumes.

Artist Bio

American, 1899–1988. Born in Pereiaslav, Ukraine (formerly Russia). Lived and worked in New York, NY.  

Louise Nevelson is most remembered for her monochromatic, assemblage wood sculptures. Her art challenges the boundaries between observer and object, each piece inviting viewers to immerse themselves in its miniature universe. Nevelson studied at the Art Students League of New York and briefly under Hans Hofmann in Munich, Germany. Her work was acquired by three major New York museums relatively early in her career: the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and the Museum of Modern Art. In 1962, she was chosen for the 31st Venice Biennale and in 1985, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Solo exhibitions of her work have been presented at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN; the Seattle Art Museum, WA; and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY. Her work resides in collections including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA; the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; the Tate Gallery, London, UK; and the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France.