FILTER RESULTS × Close
by Artist (2042)
by Century (5)
by Country (6)
by Object Type (140)
by Period (7)
Skip to Content
NEHMA logo
Showing 4439 of 5751

Print this page
Image of Untitled

William Leavitt

American, b. 1941

Untitled
1983

Pastel on paper
30.375 x 38.375 x 1.75 in.
Gift of the Kathryn C. Wanlass Foundation
2010.5

William Leavitt is associated with a group of Los Angeles artists who humorously muse about the sometimes over-the-top culture of the Southern California metropolis. Drawing inspiration from the area’s diverse architecture and exotic plant life, as well as from clichés that are prevalent in the entertainment industry, Leavitt creates quirky, open-ended narratives using settings that could be considered empty stages for which viewers are encouraged to imagine a story line.

In this untitled drawing, Leavitt juxtaposes two types of landscape, one manufactured and the other completely natural. In the center of the composition, he depicts a fountain surrounded by a precisely manicured garden, a scene based on a fountain from a plaza in an office building complex in the city’s Mid-Wilshire neighborhood, where the artist was living at the time. Contrasting with the formality of this setting is the landscape where the fountain with garden is situated, a sandy beach with the Pacific Ocean in the distance.

In spite of the irrationality of the juxtaposition and the obvious differences between the two types of settings, they do have something in common. Both, in fact, have ties to the movie industry. While constructed fountains and formal gardens were often used for staging the spectacular Hollywood movie musicals of the 1930s and 1940s, Southern California beaches were frequently the settings for the rock-and-roll films of the 1950s and 1960s.

David S. Rubin

Keywords
Click a term to view the records with the same keyword
This object has the following keywords:
bushes, flower, fountains*, gardens*, landscape, pastel, sidewalk, stairs

Exhibition List
This object was included in the following exhibitions:

Also found in
Click a portfolio name to view all the objects in that portfolio
This object is a member of the following portfolios:
Thumbnail image of Collecting on the Edge
Collecting on the Edge
Thumbnail image of Drawings
Drawings

Your current search criteria is: All Objects records.





This site facilitates access to the art and artifact collections by providing digitally searchable records for thousands objects. The information on these pages is not definitive or comprehensive. We are regularly adding artworks and updating research online. We welcome your comments.