CARL ROBERT HOLTY (1900 - 1973, AMERICAN)
Untitled.

Pencil and ink on paper laid to card, 1936. Signed, Holty, and dated, 36, lower right. Inscribed, 931, on card, verso. 185x241 mm; 7¼x9½ inches, (sheet). 280x355 mm; 11x14 inches, (card).

This ink drawing blends hard-edge and biomorphic forms in a non-objective abstract composition. Holty, and many other like-minded modernist artists began gathering in the studio of sculptor, Ibram Lassaw. In 1936, the year this drawing was created, these artists formed the American Abstract Artists group. They easily could have been called the American Non-Objective Artists if it were not for the stalwart voice of Carl Holty. He, and several of his compatriots, were insistent on not limiting the group to an expressive range outside of representational imagery. His beliefs can be witnessed quite clearly in his life's body of work that flows seamlessly from recognizable to purely abstract forms.