The Fable

Date1977

Label TextTroubled by the violent racial clashes in the United States during the 1960s, as well as the Vietnam War, Philip Guston decided to return to figurative paintings like The Fable late in his career. The cartoonish style connected the subject matter to a human history of calamity and suffering that extends far beyond the immediate moment—a sharp contrast to the socially-engaged realist paintings and murals he made as a young artist. A friend of Jackson Pollock since the late 1920s, the candid subjects of Guston’s late work were not well received when first shown in New York in the 1970s, as they followed two decades of paintings that were entirely dedicated to gestural abstraction.

Object number92.148

ProvenanceThe artist; Musa Guston; by gift to Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Washington, 1992

Photo CreditPhoto: Susan Dirk

Exhibition HistorySeattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Unpretty Pictures (Reinstallation of Galleries 411,412, and 413), June 26, 1997 - January 30, 1998. Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Anne Gerber Biennial: 2000 ½: going forward looking back, June 8 - July 16, 2000. Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Modern in America, July 8, 2004 - February 27, 2005. Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Contemporary Art from SAM Collection, March 8, 2014 - August 17, 2014.Published ReferencesStorr, Robert. Philip Guston: A Life Spent Painting. London: Laurence King Publishing, 2020; p. 197.

Credit LineGift of Musa Guston

Dimensions46 3/4 x 68 1/4 in. (118.75 x 173.36 cm)

MediumOil on canvas