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Photo courtesy Sotheby's

Night Zag Wall

In Night Zag Wall, each piece of wood has its own history. Louise Nevelson unites them by painting the whole work black, tying together disparate objects into a cohesive and monumental composition. She once explained her fascination with the color black: “You see, [black] says more for me than anything else...It means totality. It means: contains all.”

ArtistLouise Nevelson, 1899–1988
Date1969-1974
MediumPainted wood
Dimensions108 x 144 x 10 1/2 in. (274.3 x 365.8 x 26.7 cm)
Credit LineCrystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, 2008.23
ClassificationSculpture
Provenance(Pace Gallery, New York, NY); purchased by Private Collection, 1977; to (Sotheby's, New York, NY), November 12, 2008, lot 149; purchased by Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, AR, 2008
On ViewNo
Night Zag Wall108 × 144 in.Standard/Movie Poster40 × 27 in.

This artwork's face covers about 14× the area of a standard movie poster.Drawn to the same scale.