Rubbing: Bamboo

Label TextTobey was fascinated by and collected Chinese stone rubbings, and likely must have consulted the rubbings that founder Richard E. Fuller enthusiastically acquired for the Seattle Art Museum. Rubbings were a vital means of preserving ancient texts and images. They were made by pressing thin sheets of wet paper into carvings or inscriptions cut in stone. When the surface was inked, the resulting copy had white impressions (where the paper was pressed into the carving) surrounded by a black ink field. Chinese rubbings may have appeared to Tobey an ancient prototype of his own white writing.

Object number44.124

Exhibition HistorySeattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Modernism in the Pacific Northwest: The Mythic and the Mystical, June 19 - Sept. 7, 2014. Text by Patricia Junker. No cat. no., p. 38, reproduced p. 39, fig. 13.

Credit LineEugene Fuller Memorial Collection

Dimensions51 1/4 x 28in. (130.1 x 71.1cm), image 68 1/2 x 30in. (174 x 76.2cm), overall

MediumHanging scroll: Ink rubbing on paper