Berlin Abstraction

Sharp geometric fragments interlock across the canvas, with red, yellow, black, white, and blue blocks pressed together into a dense abstract arrangement. The painting dates from 1914 and was made in oil; it is held at the National Gallery of Art, where it came into the collection through the Corcoran Collection via museum purchase and the Gallery Fund. Marsden Hartley (1877–1943), an American painter, worked within Expressionism and Dada. The surface shows no single focal point, since the shapes break the picture plane into tilted, colliding sections rather than resolving into a clear scene. Edges meet at odd angles, forcing the eye to jump between the bright patches rather than settle on any one form. The overall effect is one of fractured energy, built entirely from flat color and sharp contour rather than illusion or depth.