Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/668986
12 Sans titre, 1952 Signed 'Vieira da Silva' lower right Oil on canvas 20 7 / 8 x 28 3 / 8 in, 53 x 72 cm Provenance Galerie Pierre, Paris Mrs Edwin Winter Mead, USA (acquired from the above) Exhibitions Lisbon, Fundação Arpad Szenes - Vieira da Silva, Fundação Arpad Szenes - Vieira da Silva. 20 Anos, 30 October 2014 - 25 January 2015 MARIA HELENA VIEIRA DA SILVA 1908-1992 Portuguese-born Maria Vieira da Silva became an integral member of the abstract movement in Paris after the Second World War. Studying and assimilating the early Modern styles of Cubism, Geometric Abstraction and Futurism, Vieira da Silva created poetic semi-abstract compositions that played with a sense of space and perspective. Sans titre evokes Vieira da Silva's fascination with the post-war juxtaposition of burnout cities and the natural landscape. Working from her address on the rue de la Glacière, Vieira da Silva embraced the ambiguity between lyrical and geometric form in this amalgamation of illusionistic space and abstract grid design. In this and other similar works from the period, such as The Corridor (1950) in the Tate Collection, Vieira da Silva explored interior and often labyrinthine space. As one of many émigré artists working in Paris during the post-war period, Vieira da Silva reveals her sense of dislocation through the indistinct perspective of her compositions. Setting down a loose grid of lines, without any preconceived subject in mind, the image emerges based on the artist's memories, and an intuitive sense of rhythm and pattern. This fractured representation of reality creates a psychological space that captures how the mind recalls and distorts memory, referring not only to her life in Paris, but also to the sensory experiences of her youth in Lisbon.