This bold design, together with Military Symbols 2 and Military Symbols 3 (MMA 62.15.2 and 62.15.3), reveals Hartley’s fascination with the military pageantry he saw in Berlin, where he traveled and lived between 1913 and 1914, until World War I forced him to return to the United States. Working in a manner closely related to Synthetic Cubism, Hartley combined in these drawings various military motifs: flags, uniforms, and medals. The prominent cursive "E" that appears in this work and Military Symbol 3 refers to the prestigious Queen Elizabeth regiment, to which a Prussian lieutenant, whom Hartley loved, belonged.
This image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.
Open Access
As part of the Met's Open Access policy, you can freely copy, modify and distribute this image, even for commercial purposes.
API
Public domain data for this object can also be accessed using the Met's Open Access API.
This image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.
Artwork Details
Use your arrow keys to navigate the tabs below, and your tab key to choose an item
Title:Military Symbols 1
Artist:Marsden Hartley (American, Lewiston, Maine 1877–1943 Ellsworth, Maine)
Date:1914
Medium:Charcoal on paper
Dimensions:24 1/4 × 18 1/4 in. (61.6 × 46.4 cm)
Classification:Drawings
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1962
Object Number:62.15.1
the artist (1914–d. 1943, his estate, 1943–61; estate no. 281; on consignment 1955–61 to Martha Jackson; sold in 1961 to Jackson); [Martha Jackson Gallery, New York, 1961; sold in 1961 to David Anderson]; [David Anderson Gallery, New York,1961–62; sold to MMA]
New York. Martha Jackson Gallery. "Marsden Hartley: The Berlin Period, 1913–1915. Abstract Oils and Drawings," January 3–29, 1955, no catalogue (as one of checklist nos. 13–18, "Symbols," lent by the Estate of Marsden Hartley).
New York. Anderson Galleries. "Marsden Hartley: Paintings and Drawings," April 25–May 20, 1961, no catalogue.
American Federation of Arts circulating exhibition. "From Synchromism Forward: A View of Abstract Art in America," November 1967–November 1968 (lent to numerous U.S. venues, including those listed below), no. 21.
Cedar Rapids Art Center. "From Synchromism Forward: A View of Abstract Art in America," November–December 3, 1967.
Lansing. Kresge Art Center, Michigan State University. "From Synchromism Forward: A View of Abstract Art in America," July 14–August 4, 1968.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Paintings, Drawings and Watercolors from the Museum's Collections," October 1–December 7, 1969, no catalogue.
New York. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. "Twentieth-Century American Drawing: Three Avant-Garde Generations," January 23–March 21, 1976, no. 49 (as "Military Symbol 1," ca. 1913–14).
Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden. "Amerikanische Zeichner des 20.Jahrhunderts—Drei Generationen von der Armory Show bis heute," May 27–July 11, 1976, no. 42.
Grey Art Gallery and Study Center, New York University Faculty of Arts and Science. "Changes in Perspective: 1880–1925," May 2–June 2, 1978, unnumbered cat. (p. 24).
Minneapolis. Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota. "Dictated by Life: Marsden Hartley's German Paintings and Robert Indiana's Hartley Elegies," April 14–June 18, 1995, no. 6 (dated ca. 1913–14).
Chicago. Terra Museum of American Art. "Dictated by Life: Marsden Hartley's German Paintings and Robert Indiana's Hartley Elegies," July 11–September 17, 1995, no. 6.
Hartford. Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art. "Marsden Hartley," January 17–April 20, 2003, no. 18.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "World War I and the Visual Arts," July 31, 2017–January 7, 2018 (MMA Bulletin, Fall 2017, p. 8).
Henry Geldzahler. American Painting in the Twentieth Century. New York, 1965, pp. 59–60, ill., dates it about 1913–14.
George Shane. "Abstract Art Show Opens Tour at C.R." Des Moines Register (November 19, 1967), p. 14.
"Abstract Art in U.S. Featured in Exhibit." State Journal (Lansing, Michigan) (July 14, 1968), p. D-5.
"Art." New York Times (February 1, 1976), ill. p. X31.
Barbara Sawicz inChanges in Perspective: 1880–1925. Exh. cat., Grey Art Gallery and Study Center, New York University. New York, 1978, p. 24, ill. pp. 23, back cover, dates it about 1913–14.
Elizabeth Mankin Kornhauser inMarsden Hartley. Ed. Elizabeth Mankin Kornhauser. Exh. cat., Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford. New Haven, 2002, p. 18.
Kristina Wilson inMarsden Hartley. Ed. Elizabeth Mankin Kornhauser. Exh. cat., Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford. New Haven, 2002, pp. 295–96, no. 18, ill. p. 88.
Kaitlyn Hogue Mellini inMarsden Hartley: The German Paintings, 1913–1915. Ed. Dieter Scholz. Exh. cat., Neue Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Berlin, 2014, ill. p. 179.
Jennifer Farrell. "World War I and the Visual Arts." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 75 (Fall 2017), p. 8.
Emily Schuchardt Navratil in Rick Kinsel William Low and Emily Schuchardt Navratil. Marsden Hartley: Adventurer in the Arts. Exh. cat., Bates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, Maine. London, 2020, p. 102.
Managing Editor Michael Cirigliano II explores the ways in which two queer artists, Marsden Hartley and Wilfred Owen, used their respective mediums to memorialize the effects of World War I.
Marsden Hartley (American, Lewiston, Maine 1877–1943 Ellsworth, Maine)
ca. 1917
Resources for Research
The Met's Libraries and Research Centers provide unparalleled resources for research and welcome an international community of students and scholars.
The Met Collection API is where all makers, creators, researchers, and dreamers can connect to the most up-to-date data and public domain images for The Met collection. Open Access data and public domain images are available for unrestricted commercial and noncommercial use without permission or fee.
Feedback
We continue to research and examine historical and cultural context for objects in The Met collection. If you have comments or questions about this object record, please complete and submit this form. The Museum looks forward to receiving your comments.
The Met's engagement with art from 1890 to today includes the acquisition and exhibition of works in a range of media, spanning movements in modernism to contemporary practices from across the globe.
