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R.B. Kitaj "The Defect of It's Qualities" (Georges Braque, Pablo Picasso), 1967-8

Name: R.B. Kitaj "The Defect of It's Qualities" (Georges Braque, Pablo Picasso), 1967-8
Brand: R.B. Kitaj
Availability: OutOfStock

R.B. Kitaj

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Ronald Brooks Kitaj(American, 1932–2007)

The Defects of Its Qualities, 1967–1968

Screenprint with collage on wove paper

Overall Size: 35.25 x 24 in. (89.54 x 60.96 cm.)

Framed Size: 35.5 x 24.5 in. (102.24 x 69.22 cm.)

Signed and numbered lower left in pencil

Edition 43/70

Kelpra Studio, London, printer

Marlborough Graphics London, publisher

Fully referenced in the catalogue raisonne of R.B. Kitaj. (Jane Kinsman, 1994)

In this dramatically large, rare and impressive framed collaged screenprint on hand dipped cuve BFK paper, British Pop artist R.B. Kitaj cobbles together a collage that references the Modern Cubist movement. Pablo Picasso is depicted in the upper left corner, seated in the studio where he painted Guernica, which appears directly above the signature of Georges Braque. The colors in this print are drawn from the muted palette favored by the Cubists, and the collaged elements also make reference to the movement's characteristically disjointed compositions. Other variable elements include a 19th century permit for prostitution, a newspaper clipping about Braque, and a pamphlet called "What is an Original Print?" published by the Print Council of America.

This important vintage 1960's Kitaj silkscreen won the British International Print Biennale of 1967. In original vintage study wooden hand built frame.

This print is also fully referenced in the catalogue raisonne of the prints of R.B. Kitaj (Jane Kinsman, 1994).

Especially rare stateside as it was published and printed in London.

In 1989, Kitaj published his First Diasporist Manifesto. Its epigraph came from a line in The Counterlife, the novel of his friend Philip Roth “The poor bastard had Jew on his brain.” Kitaj opens the Manifesto with the line "I've got Jew on the brain."

Kitaj viewed himself as a perennial exile -- the quintessential diasporist Jew. Even his last name -- Kitaj (appropriated from his stepfather who adopted him), means "Chinese" in the Hebrew language -- a most apropos name for a diasporist, even if it was accorded him by happenstance and not birth.

R.B. Kitaj was born in Cleveland in 1932, but spent most of his life in England. He studied at the Royal College of Art and became part of the British Pop Art movement in the early 1960s, along with David Hockney Peter Blake Eduardo Paolozzi and others. Though fiercely independent, his early work was also influenced by Abstract Expressionism and Surrealism. In 1963 Kitaj had his first one-man exhibition at the Marlborough London Gallery. In 1964 he was represented at the Venice Biennale and the Documenta "3" exhibition and in 1968 at the Documenta "4", Kassel. In 1965-66 he visited the USA and was given his first retrospective at the LA County Museum of Art. He had a large retrospective exhibition of his work from 1958 to 1981 at Washington, Cleveland and Dusseldorf. In 1997, Kitaj returned to the United States, settling in Hollywood. He remained lifelong friends with David Hockney, and in later years would make frequent trips to Hockney's studio in Paris.

Kitaj died in Los Angeles in 1994.