Baltimore Museum of Art Acquires Major Painting by Joan Witek

*Joan Witek in her Duane Street Studio, 1997. Photo: V. Crespo. Courtesy Studio of Joan Witek and Artist Estate Studio LLC, Brooklyn*

The Studio of Joan Witek and Artist Estate Studio LLC are pleased to announce that Joan Witek’s painting Introductory Glyph (1982) has been acquired by The Baltimore Museum of Art. This major purchase marks the first work by the artist to enter the collection.

“Introductory Gylph,” 1982, oil and graphite on canvas, 95 x 60 in (241.3 x 152.4 cm), The Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD. Partial gift of the artist in Honor of Dr. Lowery Sims; and Art Fund established with exchange funds from gifts of Dr. and Mrs. Edgar F. Berman, Equitable Bank, N.A., Geoffrey Gates, Sandra O. Moose, National Endowment for the Arts, Lawrence Rubin, Philip M. Stern, and Alan J. Zakon © 2023 Studio of Joan Witek / Licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY

Witek’s total appreciation and study of indigenous art specifically Pre-Columbian and art of New Guinea, are expressed in this painting. From 1964-1968, Witek was a research assistant in the Primitive Art Department at The Brooklyn Museum where she published works on the collection of Pre-Columbian, African, and American Indian Art. Later, she held the position of Assistant Curator of Primitive Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Here Introductory Glyph refers to the use of Pre-Columbian Mayan hieroglyphic writing. As the artist explains:

There is an 'introductory' or 'emblem’ glyph usually at the top left of the corner of a stele which indicates the place, city that is being recorded. These glyphs give the reader, right in the beginning, a sense of place, situation, or setting for the telling of the particular history.

This fits perfectly with my hieroglyphs and their decipherment. There is a constant language throughout waiting for that decipherment.

Rather than a series of emblems, Witek has amplified a single glyph held into place by rows and rows of vertical marks. As described in detail in her studio notes describing the making of the painting:

Vertical painting with 12 horizontal rows of 8" strokes. The top row and the two last rows are done heavier to balance the top and bottom. Center monumental vertical stroke measures approximately 69" height by 18" at widest. An 'opening' within the center of this big stroke measure approximately 3 feet. The 8" strokes are done with a hard edge and the monumental center stroke is done in a 'sketchy' way. […] This picture introduces a definable depth for the first time.

This painting was started mid-March 1982. A major portion of the paint done in 1 week - minus about 3 hours work. It was completed before a trip to Spain in April 1982. It was stretched on September 15, 1982.

By the time this painting was completed, Witek had elected to work strictly using the color black. “The breadth of this color from primitive to sophisticated, powerful to delicate, has left a wide area to explore. The beauty of black still needs to be revealed, and I hope to continue to help that discovery along.”

In 1976, Witek set up a studio on Duane Street in Lower Manhattan where her next door neighbor was the sculptor, Richard Serra. There she began working in earnest and mostly in seclusion for some years.

During the early 1980s, she began developing composition based on the ‘mark’ of a single stroke. Her chosen medium then and now was oil stick which she applied onto the canvas nailed to her studio wall—the canvas being sized using rabbit skin glue. Blue snap lines delineated the space based on preparatory drawings. Uncomfortable with the stark contrast of the mark on raw canvas, Witek used graphite power to subdue the surface. Only after the composition was complete would the work be transferred to a stretcher.

It wasn’t until the William Lieberman, curator and chair of the department of 20th Century Art at The Metropolitan Museum, purchased a major painting in 1980 that her work was institutionally recognized. This acquisition and a subsequent career survey at the Carnegie Museum of Art in 1984, brought Witek broader recognition.

In a review of her work by Dr. Lowery Stoke Sims for Arts Magazine (September 1984), Sims specifically addressed the “Introductory Glyph” writing:

Witek achieves in this composition not only an abstract geometry for landscape but also creates a language to make statements unique to herself. The different proportions of the glyphs became imbued with specific meanings that carry into other paintings.

Honoring her lifelong friend and colleague, Witek has requested that this acquisition by The Baltimore Museum of Art be named in honor of Dr. Lowery Stokes Sims.