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Photograph by Michael Fredericks
The Head of the Prophet (from the folio Salome and the Prophet)
Photograph by Michael Fredericks

The Head of the Prophet (from the folio Salome and the Prophet)

Artist Willi Baumeister German, 1889-1955
Date1946
MediumLithograph
DimensionsImage Size: 7 7/16 x 9 3/8 in. (18.9 x 23.8 cm)
Sheet: 11 3/8 x 14 1/2 in. (28.9 x 36.8 cm)
ClassificationsPrints
Credit LineBequest to The Murray Collection in honor of Terry A. Murray
Object number2013.1.2
On View
Not on view
Collections
  • Modern and Contemporary Art
  • Works on Paper
SignedBelow rt of image, in pencil, the last name of the artist in a very stylized script.
InscribedBelow image, left, in pencil, looks like the same handwrting as the signature. Possibly indicating the number in the edition and/or sheet in the folio: "Cj 2 no" (?). This sheet is the twelfth of twelve in the folio "Salome and the Prophet". An auction listing of the folio sold in 2011 also indicates that the sheets were inscribed "Orig Lith" so this may be what this inscription is indicating. THe folio was produced in an edtion of 50 so this may also be an edtion number. Bottom of sheet, LL, in pencil, cursive: "72 71-4-12 The Head of the Prophet". This is probably a later inscription by a dealer, appears to be followed by an erasure, possibly of the price?
DescriptionFrom a folio of twelve prints, "Salome and the Prophet." Abstract image of a head (of John the Baptist) a hand and a sword. The image is printed on a cream-colored ground in the center of a larger, manila sheet of thin card. The lithograph has the appearance of using frottage technique--placing paper over a textured surface and transferring that by rubbing with a soft pencil or crayon. This may have been achieved by using a roughned lithography stone.

Salome (AD 14 to 62-71AD) was the daughter of Herod and Herodias. Herodias, her mother, is said to have held a grudge against John for saying that her marriage to Herod was unlawful. When Salome danced for Herod at his birthday and Herod asked her what reward she wished, she asked for John's head as she had been told to do by her mother.
ProvenanceNew York, NY, Jane S. Murray
2013, Glens Falls, NY, The Hyde Collection Trust