Object Record
Images
Metadata
Object |
Crewelwork |
Title |
Cairo |
Artist/Creator |
Moses, Anna Mary Robertson (Grandma) |
Date |
1933 |
Description |
First woolwork picture made by Grandma Moses, in 1933. Picture of white domed building with columns in background with trees around it, reflected in water in foreground. Two Venetian gondolas in foreground. On back in Moses's handwriting, "Cairo, for Zoean" (sic). |
Width (inches) |
8.000 |
Height (inches) |
10.000 |
Information |
As Moses entered her seventh decade she found her vigorous routine of housework too strenuous and started to look for a new domestic "occupation." In her autobiography she recalls her daughter Anna asking her to make a yarn picture saying, "she had seen one like it and thought I could do better. Well, I tried it and it was a success, so I made many a picture and gave away many of them." The yarn pictures are similar in many ways to Moses’ paintings. Both are composed of broad patches of color that define the structure of the scene, set off by delicate details that look to be stitched, even when painted. Many of the embroideries depict Romantic landscapes based upon printed sources, as were many of Moses’ earliest paintings. In "Cairo," Moses’ first yarn picture, the artist whimsically intermingled images of Venetian gondolas and a Taj Mahal-like palace to create an imaginary scene all her own. |
Related People |
Moses, Anna Mary Robertson (Grandma) |
Credit line |
Gift of Mrs. Zoeanna Koloseus and Mrs. Frances Ludowieg |
Copyright owner |
Copyright © Grandma Moses Properties, New York |
Catalog Number |
1961.169.1 |