Untitled

Label

One color by itself is pretty blah. I don’t care what color you take. It’s when you put the second color next to the first color that, then things start to happen, and you get vibrations, you get, when you get purple next to an orange, things are going to happen. -- Fritz Scholder

Challenging the flat and what he deemed disingenuous representations of Native Americans by other Indigenous artists, Fritz Scholder employed masterful use of color and composition to compel a deeper contemplation of his subject. Here, the loose and gestural brushstrokes of the figure are amplified by the saturated background and its complementary shades of blue and orange.

From the 2025 exhibition Always Already: Abstraction in the United States, curated by John Stomberg, Virginia Rice Kelsey 1961 Director; Jami Powell, Associate Director of Curatorial Affairs and Curator of Indigenous Art; and Amelia Kahl, Barbara C. and Harvey P. Hood 1918 Senior Curator of Academic Programing

Exhibition History

Always Already: Abstraction in the United States, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, April 26,2025.

Provenance

Maryellen and Frank Herringer, Piedmont, California; given to the present collection, 2012.

This record is part of an active database that includes information from historic documentation that may not have been recently reviewed. Information may be inaccurate or incomplete. We also acknowledge some language and imagery may be offensive, violent, or discriminatory. These records reflect the institution’s history or the views of artists or scholars, past and present. Our collections research is ongoing.

We welcome questions, feedback, and suggestions for improvement. Please contact us at: Hood.Collections@dartmouth.edu

Subjects