{"data":{"id":"36036","type":"artwork","attributes":{"id":36036,"topgoose_id":16853,"portfolio_id":null,"tms_id":36036,"title":"Large Red Man Reading #5","display_artist_text":"Jennifer Bartlett","display_date":"1989","accession_number":"2009.194a-j","dimensions":"Dimensions variable","medium":"Oil on canvas, nine parts, with woven steel mesh","department":"collection","classification":"Installations","credit_line":"Gift of Susan and Arthur Fleischer","is_virtual":false,"is_portfolio":false,"portfolio_tms_id":null,"portfolio":"Large Man Reading","edition":null,"publication_info":"","description":"\u003cp\u003eJennifer Bartlett, \u003cem\u003eLarge Red Man Reading #5\u003c/em\u003e, 1989. Oil on canvas, nine parts, with woven steel mesh, dimensions variable. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; gift of Susan and Arthur Fleischer 2009.194a-j. ©Jennifer Bartlett\u003c/p\u003e","object_label":"\u003cp\u003eComprised of nine separate square canvases, \u003ci\u003eLarge Red Man Reading #5\u003c/i\u003e presents a series of disparate images, including a raging fire at bottom left and various patterns of tartan that surround a central image of two owls. A square, three-dimensional structure of woven steel lies on the floor, centered directly below the canvases. The title refers to a 1950 poem by Wallace Stevens, in which a poet, reading aloud, vividly describes images that become physical objects. Although Bartlett’s work is not a visual translation of the poem, she nonetheless draws inspiration from Stevens: just as the poet’s words become physical objects so too the painted tartan takes on three-dimensional form in the woven mat below the panels. Thus Bartlett inverts the traditional idea of \u003ci\u003eut pictura poesis\u003c/i\u003e (“as is painting, so is poetry”), asserting the power of painting as equal to that of poetry in its ability to make intangible representations seem tangibly real.\u003c/p\u003e","ai_alt_text":"Nine square artworks with plaid patterns and two owls arranged in a three-by-three grid on a gallery wall.","alt_text":null,"visual_description":null,"on_view":false,"created_at":"2017-08-30T17:34:51.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-02-06T12:01:18.144-05:00","images":[{"id":109713,"url":"https://whitneymedia.org/assets/artwork/36036/2009_194a-j_cropped.jpg"}]},"relationships":{"artists":{"data":[{"id":"66","type":"artist"}]}}}}