Seated Figure
1919-1920
Medium
woodcut in black on laid paper
Dimensions
image: 10.64 × 4.76 cm (4 3/16 × 1 7/8 in.) sheet: 24.61 × 15.56 cm (9 11/16 × 6 1/8 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Jack and Margrit Vanderryn
Accession Number
2015.114.10
Art Historical Context
**Seated Figure** by Max Weber, created between 1919 and1920, is a striking woodcut in black ink on laid paper, measuring just 10.64 × 4.76 cm for the image itself. This intimate scale invites close contemplation, characteristic of the artist's exploration of printmaking during a pivotal moment in early 20th-century modernism. Weber, a Russian-born Jewish immigrant who became a key figure in American avant-garde circles, drew from Cubism, Expressionism, and his cultural heritage to distill human forms into angular, abstracted geometries. The woodcut medium—carved from wood blocks to produce b...
About the Artist
Max Weber
Max Weber (1881–1961), born in Białystok in the Russian Empire (now Poland) to Orthodox Jewish parents, immigrated to Brooklyn, New York, at age ten with his family, joining his tailor father.) There, he pursued art studies at the Pratt Institute under Arthur Wesley Dow, an innovative teacher who emphasized expression and form over traditional narrative, drawing from Japanese art and Paul Gauguin....