Untitled

Untitled

Peter Blume

1929

gouache

From the collection of Museum of Modern Art

About this work

This painting shows a strange, floating cityscape. Buildings are stacked oddly—some tilt, others overlap—and a black round table sits on a wooden floor. A sign on a brick building lists ads like "Oasis Drinkers" and "American Canary." The sky is light blue with puffy clouds, but the shapes don’t match real life. The artist mixed bright colors with sharp angles, making everything look both solid and dreamlike. The paint is flat and matte, not detailed, which gives it a bold, almost toy-like feel. Next, check out gouache to see how this soft, opaque paint works.

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