Alex Katz

ALEX KATZ (Brooklyn, New York, 1927)
“Sunrise 1,” 2022.
Archival pigment print, hand-varnished, on 315 g Innova Etching Cotton Rag paper, edition 49/100.
Signed and numbered in pencil.
The edition consists of 100 copies and 20 artist’s proofs.
Printed and published by Lococo Fine Art Publisher, St. Louis.
Measurements: 137.2 x 102.9 cm (paper); 153 x 119 cm (frame).

In “Sunrise 1,” Alex Katz explores one of his most recognizable motifs: the female portrait conceived as a visually striking image, where the figure’s fashion, attitude, and presence take on an iconic dimension. The composition features a monumental close-up of a female figure wearing a wide-brimmed hat and sunglasses, rendered through a tight framing that evokes cinematic language and the visual culture of contemporary advertising. The bold cropping of the image focuses attention on the relationship between the large swaths of color and the geometric structure of the face. The shadow cast by the hat over her eyes introduces a strong contrast in light, while the violet tones of the headpiece interact with the soft hues of the background and her skin, creating a composition of great balance and visual refinement. Through refined lines, defined contours, and a rigorous economy of means, Katz transforms an everyday gesture into an image of timeless elegance.

Graphic art occupies an essential place in Alex Katz’s career. His lithographs, silkscreen prints, and woodcuts do not function as reproductions of his paintings, but rather as an autonomous field of inquiry where the artist explores the synthesis of the image, the flatness of color, and the relationship between figure and surface. The technical precision of printmaking allows him to push to the limit an aesthetic based on formal reduction and visual intensity. This work was created the same year that the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum presented *Alex Katz: Gathering*, a retrospective spanning eight decades of his career.

Alex Katz is one of the most influential figures in American art of the second half of the 20th century and one of the leading innovators of contemporary figurative painting. Trained at the Cooper Union in New York and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, he developed his own distinctive style beginning in the 1950s, characterized by formal synthesis, large formats, and the use of expansive areas of flat color. His work emerged as an alternative to the gestural style of the dominant Abstract Expressionism, anticipating many of the visual techniques that Pop Art would later consolidate, although he always maintained an independent stance with respect to that movement. He produced an outstanding body of graphic work in lithography, silkscreen, and woodcut, considered an essential part of his artistic exploration. His work is part of the permanent collections of institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Tate Modern in London, and the Centre Pompidou in Paris.