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Two Heads
1932
Paul Klee (Swiss, 1879-1940)
Not on View

As if carved from a block of wood, both heads are composed of angular planes of color that ambiguously jut forward or recede into the background. The interacting planes suggest volume, yet circles and rigid horizontals and verticals defining the facial features appear to hover in front of these planes, and have the opposite effect of flattening the space. The ambiguities are not only spatial. The gender is unknown; the space is uncertain. Are we seeing two people, or two aspects of one person? The overall impression is what Klee called "fluctuating equilibrium."

Two Heads
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Details

  • Artist Name: Paul Klee (Swiss, 1879-1940)
  • Title: Two Heads
  • Date: 1932
  • Culture: Swiss
  • Medium: Encaustic, oil (?) and pencil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 31 7/8 x 33 1/2 in. (81.0 x 85.1 cm)
  • Credit Line: Norton Simon Museum, The Blue Four Galka Scheyer Collection
  • Accession Number: P.1953.066
  • Copyright: © Norton Simon Museum

Object Information

The artist, consigned in 1933 and later sold (by Lily Klee) in 1945 to;
Galka Scheyer;
Pasadena Art Institute, Pasadena, 1953-1954;
Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena,1954-1975;
Norton Simon Museum, 1975.

Klee and America

  • The Phillips Collection, 2006-06-16 to 2006-09-10
  • The Menil Collection, 2006-10-06 to 2007-01-28

Oranges and Sardines: Conversation on Abstrat Painting with Mark Grotjahn, Wade Guyton, Mary Heilmann, Amy Sillman, Charline von Heyl, and Christopher Wool

  • Hammer Museum, 2008-11-09 to 2009-02-08

8 Modes of Modern Painting

  • New York, Julian Levy Gallery, 1934-10-22 to 1934-11-02

German Expressionist Painting, 1900 - 1950

  • Pomona College (Claremont, Calif.), 1957-10-25 to 1957-11-23
  • Santa Barbara Museum of Art, 1958-01-07 to 1958-02-09
  • University of California, Berkeley Art Museum, 1957-12-03 to 1957-12-18

The Blue Four: Feininger, Jawlensky, Kandinsky, Paul Klee

  • University of California, Los Angeles, 1933-11-13 to 1933-12-01

Recent Pictures by Paul Klee

  • Los Angeles, Putzel Gallery, 1937-11-15 to 1937-12

Paul Klee Memorial Exhibition [organized by MOMA]

  • Los Angeles, Stendahl Art Galleries, 1941-05-08 to 1941-05-18

The Blue Four: Feininger, Jawlensky, Kandinsky, Paul Klee

  • Los Angeles, Los Angeles Museum, 1933-10-04 to 1933-10-30

Klee exhibition

  • Oakland Art Gallery, 1935-09-01 to 1935-09-29

Paintings and Prints by Paul Klee

  • San Francisco Museum of Art, 1937-01-12 to 1937-02-07

Impossible Realities: Marcel Duchamp and the Surrealist Tradition

  • Norton Simon Museum, 1991-07-04 to 1992-03-08

Paul Klee

  • Norton Simon Museum, 1987-07-23 to 1988-05-15

Paul Klee 1879-1940: A Restrospective Exhibition [organized by The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and the Pasadena Art Museum]

  • Pasadena Art Museum, 1967-02-21 to 1967-02-04
  • San Francisco Museum of Art, 1967-04-13 to 1967-05-14
  • Columbus Museum of Art, 1967-05-25 to 1967-06-25
  • Cleveland Museum of Art, 1967-07-05 to 1967-08-13
  • Kansas City, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, 1967-09-01 to 1967-09-30
  • Baltimore Museum of Art, 1967-10-24 to 1967-11-19
  • St. Louis, Washington University, Gallery of Art, 1967-12-03 to 1968-01-05
  • Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1968-01-15 to 1968-02-15

30 Years of Painting, Water Colors, Drawings and Lithographs by Paul Klee

  • Modern Institute of Art (Beverly Hills, California), 1948-09-03 to 1948-10-06

Paul Klee Memorial Exhibition [organized by MOMA]

  • San Francisco Museum of Art, 1941-04-14 to 1941-05-05

Paul Klee: An Exhibition from the Galka E. Scheyer Collection of the Pasadena Art Museum

  • University of California, Berkeley Art Museum, 1962-05-03 to 1962-05-27

50 years bauhaus

  • Stuttgart, Wurttembergischer Kunstverein, 1968-05-05 to 1968-07-28
  • Royal Academy of Arts (Great Britain), 1968-09-19 to 1968-10-27
  • Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, 1968-11-30 to 1969-01-01
  • Paris, Musee National d'Art Moderne, 1969-04-01 to 1969-06-22
  • Illinois Institute of Technology, 1969-08-25 to 1969-09-26
  • Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario, 1969-12-05 to 1970-02-01
  • Pasadena Art Museum, 1970-03-16 to 1970-04-26
  • Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, 1970 to 1971
  • Tokyo, National Museum of Modern Art, 1971 to 1971

The Art of Paul Klee

  • Santa Barbara Museum of Art, 1960-04-12 to 1960-05-08

Paul Klee: Fifty Paintings, Drawings and Prints from the Galka E. Scheyer Collection

  • Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1959-10-24 to 1959-12-06
  • Minneapolis, University of Minnesota, University Gallery, 1960-01-04 to 1960-02-08
  • Minneapolis, Walker Art Center, 1960-03 to 1960-04

Paul Klee

  • Norton Simon Museum, 1986-06-05 to 1987-06-28

The Galka Scheyer Collection: Klee, Nolde, Jawlensky, Moholy-Nagy, Schmidt-Rottluff, Schwitters, Archipenko, Kandinsky, Lissitzky, Feininger, Kirchner, Dix_1

  • La Jolla, Art Center in La Jolla, 1960-07-05 to 1960-08-14

The Spirit of Modernism: Galka Scheyer in the New World

  • Norton Simon Museum, 1994-11-17 to 1996-01-14

My Four Kings: Galka Scheyer and the Blue Four

  • Norton Simon Museum, 2002-12-13 to 2003-04-14

The Blue Four-Galka Scheyer Collection From The Norton Simon Museum

  • Henry Art Gallery, 1997-07-17 to 1997-10-05
Paul Klee, p. 31
Verdi, Richard, The Burlington Magazine, note 32 p. 153
Huggler, Max, The Drawings of Paul Klee, p. 24
Huggler, Max, Paul Klee: Die Malerei als Blick in den Kosmos, p. 140
The Blue Four Galka Scheyer Collection, Norton Simon Museum of Art at Pasadena, no. 288
Paul Klee: Catalogue Raisonne, Volume 6, 1931-1933, fig. 5028 p. 297
Barnett, Vivian Endicott, The Blue Four Collection at the Norton Simon Museum, no. 345 pp. 336-337
Wyatt, Jean, Risking Difference: Identification, Race and Community in Contemporary Fiction, cover
Sotheby's, Boundless: India, p. 65 ; p. 65 (ill.)

Additional Artwork by Artist

Absorption Paul Klee 1919
Arabian Bride Paul Klee 1924
First Drawing for "Specter of a Genius" Paul Klee 1922
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