Cathedra

Cathedra, Barnett Newman, 1951

One of my favourite paintings by one of my favourite artists. This piece is also one of three Newman pieces that have been attacked: in November of 1997, Gerard Jan van Bladeren slashed the canvas, housed at Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, with a carpet knife.

This was his second act of vandalism against a Newman: in 1986, he slashed with a blade Newman’s first Who’s Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue? canvas, bizarrely ranting against Jews, the Japanese, flatness in art, both abstraction and realism, and apparent plans for “a new Holocaust”. The restored Cathedra was put on display in 2002 — this time, behind plexiglass.

You can read about this case over at Art Crimes.