Fritz Scholder Monotype titled “Summer Hills #3” [R]

“Summer Hills #3” is a monotype by Luiseño painter Fritz Scholder. At 30 inches by 41 inches, it is a large piece—significantly larger than the Tamarind lithographs with which collectors are familiar. Monotype printing offers certain advantages over lithography that were likely attractive to Scholder, including freedom to compose multicolored images spontaneously.  He was able to use a wider variety of colors, too, and to mix his chosen colors in ways that were impossible with other printmaking methods.  Most of Scholder’s monotypes were completed at Santa Fe’s Hand Graphics and Scottsdale’s Rezvani Workshop. This piece comes from Rezvani.

“Summer Hills #3” is a landscape, which is an unusual subject for Scholder. The hills are made of a rich green, covering about two thirds of the image with a dense web of lively brushstrokes. When making monotypes, artists will often manipulate their paints after applying them to the original surface. Here, we see areas in which Scholder scraped or removed thin lines of paint, creating movement and textural variation within the hills. Up above, a gorgeous burgundy color forms the sky. This is a rare and beautiful example of Fritz Scholder exploring otherworldly desert landscapes.

The piece is signed Scholder in lower right, titled “Summer Hills #3” in lower left, and marked with the chop mark of Rezvani Workshop. It is in its original frame, which displays the entire print over an off-white backing, under glass.

Fritz Scholder (1937-2005) was by birth one-quarter Luiseño Indian, a California Mission Tribe. He was born in Minnesota, spent two decades in the Dakotas, and lived in Galisteo, NM, and Scottsdale, AZ.  Scholder came to Santa Fe in 1964 to teach advanced painting and art history at the new Institute of American Indian Arts, a school established by the United States Department of the Interior. He obtained a Master of Fine Arts degree at the University of Arizona in 1964 before moving to Santa Fe and joining IAIA.  Fritz Scholder enjoyed a long and successful career and is regarded today as one of the most innovative and influential Native artists.

Condition: excellent condition

Provenance: this Fritz Scholder Monotype titled "Summer Hills #3" is from a private Santa Fe collection, originally purchased from Ramona Scholder

Recommended Reading: Flirting with Possessions: Scholder’s Life as an Artist, Nazraeli Press Books, 1997

TAGS: Luiseño Indian, Santa Fe, Paintings, Lithographs, Albuquerque, Fritz Scholder