Untitled (Study for Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well)

Cat. No. 575, study

Untitled (Study for Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well)

Date:
1995-1996
Themes
Faces & Portaits, Figures, Objects
Techniques
Other Techniques
Support:
Smooth, wove paper
Dimensions:
sheet: 11 x 8 1/2" (27.9 x 21.6 cm)
Signature:
Not signed
Publisher
unpublished
Edition:
1 known photocopy study
Impression:
Not numbered
Curatorial Remarks:
In 1941, Bourgeois and her family purchased a small country house in Easton, Connecticut, which remains in the family.
Description:
Photocopy, with blue ink and pencil additions
Inscription:
“margelle height / width” upper right sheet, pencil, artist’s hand. Verso: "Curb, Brink, of the well / The well (is not so well) / c’est le monde circulaire / de la margelle du puits / pas ovale – circulaire / les asperites dans [illeg.] / du puits” upper to center sheet, pencil, artist’s hand; “Do not go near the well, La [illeg.] est / [illeg.] pas d’eau dans la maison / Mr [illeg.]; plumber doit [illeg.]; / It is not a dry well, it is a living well or will / Les 'Peurs' [illeg.] condenseés auteur du / puits, les tuyaux, les [illeg.], le gel, la trappe / dans le / sol de la / salle a in anger. I had never thought / of the well as a trap, never, family trap. / Je si ai pus [illeg.] de savoir pourquoi ce / cauchemar renait pourquoi faire.” center to lower sheet, blue ink, artist’s hand.
Artist’s Remarks:
About the source drawing for plate 2 of 9, Bourgeois said: "We lived in Easton, where there was no city water and we were totally dependent on the well. The water table was low in Easton, so the well was quite deep.
The guilt feeling and the severity that inhabited the house were expressed by, 'You better be good or I'll push you down the well.' You see, that was the ultimate punishment. Certainly, I didn't push anybody into the well, but look at these here, one and two...my sons Jean-Louis and Alain. I did something wrong and sure enough, they pushed me in. I'm not accusing them....
The figure is screaming at the bottom of the well.
We have tunnel vision and we have bottom-of-the-well vision. If you visualize yourself down there, the question is, how are you going to get out? This philosophy is an optimistic philosophy. By hook or by crook, you are going to get yourself out. And I always did. But how? By drawing." (Quote cited in Bourgeois, Louise and Lawrence Rinder. "Louise Bourgeois Drawings and Observations." Berkeley: University Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive University of California, Berkeley; Boston: Bulfinch Press, 1995, p. 76.)

"When you are at the bottom of the well, you look around and you say, who is going to get me out? In this case, Jerry [Gorovoy, the artist's assistant,] comes and he presents a rope, and I hook myself on the rope and he pulls me out. You see I can conceive of a way of getting out of the well. I'm not drowning. I'm just waiting for somebody." Interview with Lawrence Rinder, 9 May 1995 (Quote cited in Morris, Frances. "Louise Bourgeois" London: Tate Modern, 2007, p. 150.)
Other Remarks:
According to the artist's assistant, Jerry Gorovoy, this composition refers to Bourgeois's idea to use a magnet to pull the well cover up from the bottom of the well at her country house.
© The Easton Foundation/VAGA at ARS, NY

Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well

1995-1996

Source

sketchbook date: 1950s-1980s

Untitled, no. 20 of 34, from the sketchbook, Album à Dessin
Studies
Untitled (Study for Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well)
States
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well
Untitled, plate 8 of 9, from the portfolio, The View from the Bottom of the Well

Portfolio

1996

The View from the Bottom of the Well

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