The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of May 18, 2025

Forest Fire, Jan. 5, 1984

1984
(American, 1951-)
America
latex, plaster, and tar on vinyl tile over masonite
Panel: 122 x 122 cm (48 1/16 x 48 1/16 in.)
Gift of Agnes Gund 2017.126.b
© Donald Sultan/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Location: not on view

Did You Know?

Sultan’s father worked in a tire retreading shop which motivated the artist to use industrial materials.

Description

This multipanel work, showing a raging forest fire, belongs to Donald Sultan’s Disaster Painting series. Sultan layers tar, vinyl, latex, and plaster to create ominous landscapes of industrial and environmental destruction. Dripping tar forms skeletal trees and muddies the gray sky. Orange latex licks at dead branches, engulfs trees in flames, and peels from the linoleum surface. Drawing on source imagery from newspapers, the Disaster Painting series speaks to, in the artist’s words, the “impermanence of all things.”
  • Catlin, Roger. “This Artist’s Worldview Drips with Unending Pessimism,” Smithsonian Magazine, June 5, 2017. www.smithsonianmag.com
    Guida, Isabella. “The Surrealism of Witness,” ArtsEditor, August 28, 2017. artseditor.com
    Sultan, Donald. Donald Sultan: 8 February-3 March, 1984, Blum Helman, New York, New York. New York: Blum Helman Gallery, 1984 9
    Sergeant, Philippe, and Donald Sultan. Donald Sultan, Appoggiaturas. New York: Portmanteau Press, 1992
    Ratcliff, Carter, and John B. Ravenal. Donald Sultan: The Theater of the Object. New York: Vendome Press, 2008 55
    Hearst, Alison, Charles Wylie, Max Blagg, and Donald Sultan. Donald Sultan: The Disaster Paintings, 2016. Mentioned p. 19, reproduced pl. 5, p. 40.
    Truong, Alain R. “The Cleveland Museum of Art Announces New Acquisitions,” Alain Truong, September 27, 2017. www.alaintruong.com
    Lancelin, Hervé. “Donald Sultan: The Alchemist of Tar,” ArtCritic, January 8, 2025. www.artcritic.com
  • Donald Sultan: The Disaster Paintings. Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Fort Worth, TX (organizer) (February 19-April 23, 2017); Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC (May 26-September 4, 2017); North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh, NC (September 23-December 31, 2017); Sheldon Museum of Art, Lincoln, NE (January 24-May 13, 2018).
  • {{cite web|title=Forest Fire, Jan. 5, 1984|url=false|author=Donald Sultan|year=1984|access-date=18 May 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2017.126.b