Untitled (Derby Hat)
1972
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
color photogravure
Dimensions
plate: 33.66 × 26.19 cm (13 1/4 × 10 5/16 in.) sheet: 24.29 × 37.78 cm (9 9/16 × 14 7/8 in.)
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of the Woodward Foundation, Washington, D.C.
Accession Number
1976.56.11
Art Historical Context
Step into the enchanting world of Joseph Cornell with *Untitled (Derby Hat, a 1972 color photogravure that captures the artist's late-career fascination with the poetic ordinary. Cornell, a pioneering American Surrealist known for his intricate glass-fronted box assemblages filled with found objects, ephemera, and dreamlike vignettes, here turns his gaze to a simple derby hat—elevating everyday attire into a meditative emblem of memory and whimsy. Printed via photogravure, a 19th-century intaglio process adapted for photography, this work produces exceptionally rich, velvety tones and subtle ...
About the Artist
Joseph Cornell
Joseph Cornell (1903–1972) was an American artist and filmmaker best known for his poetic assemblage boxes — small, glass-fronted shadow boxes containing carefully arranged collections of found objects that create intimate, dreamlike worlds. Born in Nyack, New York, he had no formal art training and spent most of his life in a modest house on Utopia Parkway in Flushing, Queens, caring for his disa...