A kaleidoscope of dazzling color and fragmented form, Stella’s abstract painting evokes the electric lights and energetic crowds of Brooklyn’s Coney Island amusement park and boardwalk. Celebrating the intoxicating and sometimes disorienting dynamism of modern life, Coney Island reveals the painter’s knowledge of Italian Futurism, which Stella was exposed to during a trip to Italy and France in 1910–11. The composition’s circular, or tondo, format links it to Renaissance depictions of holy subjects.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Coney Island
Artist:Joseph Stella (American (born Italy) Muro Lucano 1877–1946 New York, New York)
Date:1914
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:Diam: 41 3/4 in. (106 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:George A. Hearn Fund, 1963
Accession Number:63.69
Inscription: Signed (lower right): Jos.Stella
Renee and Chaim Gross, New York; [Forum Gallery, New York, until 1963; sold to MMA]
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "The Decade of the Armory Show: New Directions in American Art 1910–1920," February 27–April 14, 1963, no. 94 (as "Madonna of Coney Island," ca. 1915, lent by Mr. and Mrs. Chaim Gross).
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Joseph Stella," October 23–December 4, 1963, no. 9 (as "Madonna of Coney Island," ca. 1917–18).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Three Centuries of American Painting," April 9–October 17, 1965, unnum. checklist.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. "Masterpieces of Painting in The Metropolitan Museum of Art," September 16–November 1, 1970, unnumbered cat. (p.115).
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. "Great American Paintings from the Boston and Metropolitan Museums," November 30, 1970–January 10, 1971, no. 84.
Saint Louis, Mo. City Art Museum. "Great American Paintings from the Boston and Metropolitan Museums," January 28–March 7, 1971, no. 84.
Seattle Art Museum. "Great American Paintings from the Boston and Metropolitan Museums," March 25–May 9, 1971, no. 84.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Installation of the 20th Century Paintings and Sculpture Galleries," opened October 5, 1971.
Edinburgh. Royal Scottish Academy. "The Modern Spirit: American Painting 1908–1935," August 19–September 10, 1977, no. 103a (dated about 1915).
London. Hayward Gallery. "The Modern Spirit: American Painting 1908–1935," September 27–November 27, 1977, no. 103a.
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Synchronism and American Color Abstraction, 1910–1925," January 24–March 26, 1978, unnumbered cat. (pl. 155).
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. "Synchronism and American Color Abstraction, 1910–1925," April 20–June 18, 1978, unnumbered cat.
Des Moines Art Center. "Synchronism and American Color Abstraction, 1910–1925," July 6–September 3, 1978, unnumbered cat.
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. "Synchronism and American Color Abstraction, 1910–1925," September 22–November 19, 1978, unnumbered cat.
Syracuse, N. Y. Everson Museum of Art. "Synchronism and American Color Abstraction, 1910–1925," December 15, 1978–January 28, 1979, unnumbered cat.
Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts. "Synchronism and American Color Abstraction, 1910–1925," February 15–March 24, 1979, unnumbered cat.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Painting: 1905–1950," April 19–October 7, 1991, no catalogue.
New York. Whitney Museum of American Art. "Joseph Stella," April 22–October 9, 1994, unnumbered cat. (fig. 62; as "Coney Island [Madonna of Coney Island]").
Paris. Centre Pompidou, Galerie 1. "Dreamlands: Des parcs d'attractions aux cités du futur," May 5–August 9, 2010, unnumbered cat. (p. 61; as "View of Coney Island").
Robert M. Coates. "The Art Galleries: One-Note Man." New Yorker (November 23, 1963), p. 186.
Henry Geldzahler. American Painting in the Twentieth Century. New York, 1965, pp. 69–70, ill.
Leo Lerman. The Museum: One Hundred Years and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1969, ill. p. 360.
Thomas N. Maytham. Great American Paintings from the Boston and Metropolitan Museums. Exh. cat., National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. Seattle, 1970, pp. 18, 130, no. 84, ill. p. 132 (color), dates it about 1915.
Irma B. Jaffe. Joseph Stella. Cambridge, Mass., 1970, pp. 41, 196 no. 41,, discusses Coney Island series; calls it "Madonna of Coney Island" and dates it between 1914–18.
Thomas M. Folds inMasterpieces of Painting in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Exh. cat., Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. New York, [1970], p. 115, ill. (color), dates it about 1915.
John I. H. Baur with research by Irma B. Jaffe. Joseph Stella. American Art & Artists, New York, 1971, p. 34, colorpl. II, date it ca. 1917–18.
Nora B. Beeson. Guide to The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1972, p. 277, fig. 5.
Marshall B. Davidson. The American Heritage History of the Artists' America. New York, 1973, pp. 290–91, ill. (color).
"A Bicentennial Treasury: American Masterpieces from the Metropolitan." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 33 (Winter 1975–76), ill. p. 243.
John Dillenberger in Jane Dillenberger and John Dillenberger. Perceptions of the Spirit in Twentieth-Century American Art. Exh. cat., Indianapolis Museum of Art. Indianapolis, 1977, p. 50, dates it about 1915.
Alma Jones Waterhouse. "The Yeses of Chaim Gross." Connoisseur (May 1985), p. 124, calls it "Madonna of Coney Island"; remarks that Chaim Gross found this work "in a framing shop and bought in exchange for one of his own lithographs plus $180 from more prize money".
John Dorsey. "New Wing Lifts the Met Into the 20th Century." Sun (Baltimore, Md.) (February 1, 1987), p. 12K, calls it "The Madonna of Coney Island" and dates it ca. 1915.
Barbara Haskell. Joseph Stella. Exh. cat., Whitney Museum of American Art. New York, 1994, pp. 43, 46, 268, fig. 63 (color), discusses Coney Island series.
Thomas J. Ferraro. "'My Way' in 'Our America': Art, Ethnicity, Profession." American Literary History 12 (Autumn 2000), p. 504, calls it "Madonna of Coney Island".
Carol Bonomo Albright. "Greenwich Village." Italian Americana 26 (Summer 2008), p. 217, calls it "Madonna of Coney Island".
Innis Howe Shoemaker. Adventures in Modern Art: The Charles K. Williams II Collection. Exh. cat., Philadelphia Museum of Art. Philadelphia, 2009, p. 277, calls it "Madonna of Coney Island".
Susan Greenberg Fisher inBuilding Identity: Chaim Gross and Artists' Homes and Studios in New York City, 1953–74. Exh. cat., Renee and Chaim Gross Foundation. New York, 2017, p. 1, remarks that the Grosses sold this work to MMA to help purchase their apartment at 526 LaGuardia Place, which previously hung in their living room at 30 West 105th Street, New York.
Stephanie Mayer Heydt inJoseph Stella: Visionary Nature. Exh. cat., Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, Fla. Atlanta, 2022, pp. 20–24, 32 n. 23, fig. 6 (color) and ill. p. 14 (color detail).
Ellen E. Roberts inJoseph Stella: Visionary Nature. Exh. cat., Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, Fla. Atlanta, 2022, p. 36.
Ara H. Merjian inJoseph Stella: Visionary Nature. Exh. cat., Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, Fla. Atlanta, 2022, pp. 58–59.
Joseph Stella (American (born Italy) Muro Lucano 1877–1946 New York, New York)
ca. 1920
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