The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 20, 2025

Horizontally oriented oil painting like an abstracted, sparse forest with angular, mossy-patch covered trees framed against blotchy blue sky. Left, three purple stalks curve into each other. Right, rises a straight, thick orange-brown trunk. Center and half the height stands a tree with orange-brown triangular protrusions, roots digging into a ground with as many mossy patches as the trees. A white, bat-like creature with one pointed wing twice the other's length flies across the center.

Crystallization of the Forest

1946

Jacques Hérold

(Romanian, 1910–1987)
Romania, 20th century
oil on panel
Unframed: 60 x 73 cm (23 5/8 x 28 3/4 in.)
John L. Severance Fund 2003.94
© Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Location: 225 German Expressionism & Surrealism

Did You Know?

During his lifetime, Jacques Hérold created cover artwork and illustrations for more than 80 books by the writers such as Tristan Tzara and the Marquis de Sade, among many others.

Description

Born Herold Blumer into a Jewish family in Romania, Jacques Hérold moved to Paris in 1930, changed his name, became friends with Yves Tanguy, and became part of the Surrealist circle of artists and writers active in the French capital at the time. The theme of an untamed, menacing forest was a recurring metaphor in Surrealist art and literature. The artist made this forest scene—with a batlike creature flying through the air—when the spread of atomic weapons was inciting fears of nuclear annihilation.
  • André Breton collection
  • {{cite web|title=Crystallization of the Forest|url=false|author=Jacques Hérold|year=1946|access-date=20 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2003.94