The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of July 9, 2025

Bedford II

1981
(American, 1925–1992)
America
color lithograph
Sheet: 108.4 x 82.5 cm (42 11/16 x 32 1/2 in.)
Nancy F. and Joseph P. Keithley Collection Gift 2020.245
© Estate of Joan Mitchell
Catalogue raisonné: 364:JM2
Location: not on view

Did You Know?

To make this print, Mitchell painted clear sheets of Mylar, which allowed her to layer colors for printing and retain a sense of immediacy.

Description

Abstract painter Joan Mitchell’s monumental lithographs convey her experience of the landscape and combine the complexity, intensity, and fluidity of abstracted lines that are fundamental to her work. In this lithograph, part of her Bedford series, 1981, heavily abstracted, dense bands of colorretain traces of the natural world, while the rich blues and greens represent the inextricable relationship in Mitchell’s work between color, feeling, and landscape.
  • ?-2011
    (Mary Ryan Gallery, New York, NY, sold to Nancy F. and Joseph P. Keithley, Cleveland, OH)
    2011-2020
    Nancy F. and Joseph P. Keithley Collection, Cleveland, OH
    September 14, 2020
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Tyler, Kenneth E. Tyler Graphics: Catalogue Raisonné, 1974-1985. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 1987. 364:JM2
  • Impressionism to Modernism: The Keithley Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 11, 2022-January 8, 2023).
  • {{cite web|title=Bedford II|url=false|author=Joan Mitchell|year=1981|access-date=09 July 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2020.245