Art, literature & historyFerragosto IV
Cy Twombly · 1961
Cy Twombly: 1928–2011
Other names (5)
Edwin Parker "Cy" Twombly, Jr., Edwin Parker, Jr. Twombly, Edwin Parker Twobly, Edwin Parker Twombly, Edwin Parker Twombly Jnr
Biography
Edwin Parker "Cy" Twombly Jr. (; April 25, 1928 – July 5, 2011) was an American painter, sculptor, and photographer.
Twombly influenced artists such as Anselm Kiefer, Francesco Clemente, Julian Schnabel, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. His best-known works are typically large-scale, freely-scribbled, calligraphic and graffiti-like works on solid fields of mostly gray, tan, or off-white colors. His later paintings and works on paper shifted toward "romantic symbolism", and their titles can be interpreted visually through shapes and forms and words. Twombly often quoted poets such as Stéphane Mallarmé, Rainer Maria Rilke, and John Keats, as well as classical myths and allegories, in his works. Examples of this are his Apollo and The Artist and a series of eight drawings consisting solely of inscriptions of the word "Virgil".
Twombly's works are in the permanent collections of modern art museums globally, including the Menil Collection in Houston, the Tate Modern in London, New York's Museum of Modern Art and Munich's Museum Brandhorst. He was commissioned for a ceiling at the Musée du Louvre in Paris.
In a 1994 retrospective, curator Kirk Varnedoe described Twombly's work as "influential among artists, discomfiting to many critics and truculently difficult not just for a broad public, but for sophisticated initiates of postwar art as well." Writing in Artforum, Travis Jeppesen went further, declaring Twombly to be "the greatest American painter of the twentieth century, and the greatest painter after Picasso, period."
Wikipedia contributors. Opening excerpt, formatted for reading. CC BY-SA 4.0. Source revision.
Influenced by
- Robert Motherwelleditorial inference
Evidence
Explicit secondary-source assertion; independent historical verification remains pending.
- Franz Klineeditorial inference
Evidence
Explicit secondary-source assertion; independent historical verification remains pending.
- Jean Dubuffeteditorial inference
Evidence
Explicit secondary-source assertion; independent historical verification remains pending.
- Pierre Dauraeditorial inference
Evidence
Wikidata assertion retained for review; its references, if supplied, have not been independently verified. Teaching is recorded separately and does not itself establish artistic influence.
- Franz Klineeditorial inference
Evidence
Wikidata assertion retained for review; its references, if supplied, have not been independently verified. Teaching is recorded separately and does not itself establish artistic influence.
- Robert Motherwelleditorial inference
Evidence
Wikidata assertion retained for review; its references, if supplied, have not been independently verified. Teaching is recorded separately and does not itself establish artistic influence.
- Alberto Giacomettieditorial inference
Evidence
Explicit secondary-source assertion; independent historical verification remains pending.
- Jackson Pollockeditorial inference
Evidence
Explicit secondary-source assertion; independent historical verification remains pending.
- Ben Shahneditorial inference
Evidence
Wikidata assertion retained for review; its references, if supplied, have not been independently verified. Teaching is recorded separately and does not itself establish artistic influence.
- Willem de Kooningeditorial inference
Evidence
Explicit secondary-source assertion; independent historical verification remains pending.
Artworks by year
Loading chronology…Museum / collectionAll collections
Finding recorded artworks…
Museums & collections
Documented holdings of works attributed to Cy Twombly. Check the museum’s record for current display information.
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art31 recorded works
- National Gallery of Art11 recorded works
- Art Institute of Chicago6 recorded works
- The Cleveland Museum of Art6 recorded works
- Museum of Modern Art4 recorded works
