Collection Online as of March 26, 2023

Las Meninas

2019

Part of a set. See all set records

Simone Leigh

(American, b. 1967)

America

Terracotta, steel, raffia, porcelain

Overall: 182.9 x 213.4 x 152.4 cm (72 x 84 x 60 in.)

Purchased with funds donated by Scott Mueller 2019.175

Location

229A Contemporary

Fun Fact

The hollow face is surrounded by dozens of small porcelain flowers.

Description

Las Meninas draws on traditions throughout global art and culture to address issues surrounding the female body, race, beauty, and community. The work’s skirted form conjures figures from the Spanish Golden Age painting Las Meninas (1656) by Diego Velazquez, apparel worn in the Afro-Brazilian religious tradition candomblé, and Mousgoum buildings in Cameroon. The white-glazed terracotta torso, alluding to sacred and secular traditions of body painting, leads to a faceless head, incorporating both figuration and abstraction.

Provenance

2019

(Luhring Augustine Gallery, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

2019-

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Citations

Simone Leigh. New York, N.Y.: Luhring Augustine, 2019.

Rhodes-Pitts, Sharife. "Simone Leigh: For Her Own Pleasure and Edification." In The Hugo Boss Prize 2018. New York: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 2018.

Leigh, Simone. "Portfolio: Simone Leigh." In Public Servants: Art and the Crises of the Common Good, edited by Johanna Burton, Shannon Jackson, and Dominic Willsdon, 222-227. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2016.

Conde, Maryse, Jota Mombaca, and Peggy Piesche. We Don't Need Another Hero:10th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art. Berlin: Distanz, 2018. Mentioned p. 138

Trigger: Gender As a Tool and a Weapon. Edited by Johanna Burton and Natalie Bell. New York: New Museum, 2017. Mentioned pp. 108-111

Elderton, Louisa, and Rebecca Morrill, eds. Vitamin C: Clay + Ceramic in Contemporary Art. London: Phaidon Press Limited, 2017. Mentioned pp. 160-63

Cafritz, Peggy Cooper, Njideka Akunyili Crosby, and Charmaine Picard. Fired Up! Ready to Go!: Finding Beauty, Demanding Equity : an African American Life in Art : the Collections of Peggy Cooper Cafritz. 2018. Referenced p. 169

Fellah, Nadiah Rivera. “Simone Leigh: The artist's Las Meninas, acquired last year, invites examination of the relationship between artist, subject, and viewer.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 60, no. 4 (Fall 2020): 14-15. Reproduced and Mentioned: P. 14-15.

"New Take on the New: A comprehensive reinstallation of the galleries of contemporary art offers fresh viewpoints on the art of our time.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 61, no. 2 (Spring 2021): Cover, 4-9. Reproduced: P. 9; Mentioned: P. 4, 8.

Lee, Key Jo, and William Griswold. Perceptual Drift: Black Art and an Ethics of Looking. Cleveland, OH : Cleveland Museum of Art, 2022. Mentioned: pp. 63-78; reproduced: p. 62, fig. 31

Exhibition history

TEFAF New York Spring 2019. Luhring Augustine Gallery, New York (March 3-7, 2019)

Contemporary Gallery Reinstallation 2021. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer).