Skip to main content
Label Text Repeated forms swarm together in the center of this painting. They are small versions of stereotypical features (lips and eyes) of minstrel performers. Minstrel shows were a popular entertainment in the 1840s to the early 1900s that portrayed ethnic groups, especially Black people, in racist ways. In these shows, performers blackened their faces with burnt cork and exaggerated their lips and eyes with red and white paints. Gallagher is interested in the historic and social weight of this imagery, but is also drawn to them as abstract forms. Another inspiration is jazz, which is reflected in the visual rhythm created by repeating shapes. Gallagher takes this mix of abstracted, rhythmic forms and turns them into a literal expression of her own nickname. “E l l” appears in a somewhat childlike scrawl, with lines that reference the rough-lined paper and writing of school children. The title of the work, ly, can then be placed with the painted letters to form “Elly.” July 22, 2020
Published References"Fabulism", Joselyn Art Museum, 2004
DimensionsCanvas (/image): 72 × 84 in. (182.9 × 213.4 cm)
Accession Number 2001.2
Classificationspainting
ProvenanceArtist; (Gagosian Gallery, New York); Des Moines Art Center [purchased from the previous, 2000]
Ly
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Ellen Lanyon
1973
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Robert Jessup
1986
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Stanley Robert Boxer
1973
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Sean Scully
2003-2004
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Hedda Sterne
1949
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Cecily Brown
2005
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Marsden Hartley
1927
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Judy Rifka
1984
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Anonymous
ca. 1830-1835
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
John Currin
1998