Salt Wave
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View on museum website →Medium
color softground etching and engraving
Dimensions
plate: 29.5 x 21.9 cm (11 5/8 x 8 5/8 in.) sheet: 40 x 28.9 cm (15 3/4 x 11 3/8 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Ruth Cole Kainen
Accession Number
2012.92.103
Art Historical Context
**Salt Wave**, a captivating color softground etching and from 1979 by Stanley William Hayter, viewers into the fluid world of late 20th-century printmaking. Created when Hayter was in his late 70s, this intimate work measures 29.5 x 21.9 cm on the plate its dynamic forms suggesting crashing waves textured with crystalline salt—evoking both natural energy and abstract experimentation. Now housed in the National Gallery of Art a gift from Ruth Cole Kainen, it exemplifies the department's commitment to innovative prints. Hayter, a pioneering British artist (1901–1988), founded the legendary Ate...
About the Artist
Stanley William Hayter
Stanley William Hayter (1901–1988), born in Hackney, London, to painter and sign-maker William Harry Hayter, initially pursued a scientific career, earning a degree in chemistry and geology from King's College London. He worked as a research chemist for the Anglo-Persian Oil Company in Abadan, Iran, from 1922 to 1925, painting portraits of colleagues in his spare time; an exhibition of these upon ...