Hotel du Nord (Little Dürer)
c. 1950
Joseph Cornell (American, 1903-1972)
Not on View

Using found materials from New York City thrift stores, Joseph Cornell created dozens of fantastical worlds in glass-covered boxes. A self-taught artist, he rarely left his home in Flushing, Queens, where he lived with his mother and cared for his brother with cerebral palsy. Despite his rather reclusive life, Cornell was extremely well read and equally well versed in the contemporary New York art scene. Drawing on the complexity and whimsy of surrealism, he layered materials in his assemblages to speak to a profound artistic sophistication championed by fellow artists. Here he has reproduced Albrecht Dürer’s Self-Portrait at Age 13 in a prominent position, as well as an anonymous 15th-century portrait of a child with clasped hands. The incorporation of portraiture here is multilayered, speaking to Cornell’s affinity with the artists who have preceded him as well as to the formal qualities found in the pictures themselves.

Details

  • Artist Name: Joseph Cornell (American, 1903-1972)
  • Title: Hotel du Nord (Little Dürer)
  • Date: c. 1950
  • Medium: Assemblage: painted box, metal ring and chain, wood blocks, printed paper, reproductions of Durer's "Self-portrait at age 13," Durer's drawing of a rabbit, and a reproduction of an anonymous fifteenth century portrait of a child with clasped hands
  • Dimensions: 17-7/8 x 12 x 3-13/16 in. (45.4 x 30.5 x 9.7 cm)
  • Credit Line: Norton Simon Museum, Museum Purchase with funds contributed by the Charles and Ellamae Storrier-Stearns Fund and Fellows Acquisition Fund
  • Accession Number: P.1967.10
  • Copyright: © 2022 The Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY

Object Information

The artist (Pasadena Art Museum, on long term loan beginning 8 October 1964; donated by the artist in 1967 to;
League in Aid of Crippled Children, Inc., New York, sold for $13,500 (in two payments, first installment 1 August 1967; second installment 1 February 1968) to;
Pasadena Art Museum, Pasadena, passed 1975 to;
The Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena.

An Exhibition of Works by Joseph Cornell

  • Pasadena Art Museum, 1967-01-09 to 1967-02-11

Kurt Schwitters and Related Developments

  • , 1973-03-09 to 1973-05-06

New York Paintings and Sculpture 1940-1970

  • New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1969-10-18 to 1970-02-08

Joseph Cornell

  • Michigan, The J. L. Hudson Gallery, to 1965-10-30

4. Documenta Kassel '68

  • Orangerie-Auepark, Museum Fridericianum, Galerie-Schone Aussicht, 1968-06-27 to 1968-10-06

Gaze: Portraiture After Ingres

  • Norton Simon Museum, 2009-10-30 to 2010-04-05

A Salute to the Ferus Gallery

  • Norton Simon Museum, 1993-09-23 to 1994-03-20

Impossible Realities: Marcel Duchamp and the Surrealist Tradition

  • Norton Simon Museum, 1991-07-04 to 1992-03-08

46 N. Los Robles: A History of The Pasadena Art Museum

  • USC Pacific Asia Museum, 2011-11-17 to 2012-04-08

Dark Visions: Mid-Century Macabre

  • Norton Simon Museum, 2016-09-02 to 2017-01-16

Lost but Found: Assemblage, Collage and Sculpture, 1920-2002

  • Norton Simon Museum, 2004-11-05 to 2005-03-28

Significant Objects: The Spell of Still Life

  • Norton Simon Museum, 2012-07-20 to 2013-01-21

Modernism in Miniature

  • Norton Simon Museum, 2022-08-12 to 2023-01-09

Radical Past: Contemporary Art and Music in Pasadena, 1960-1974

  • Norton Simon Museum, 1999-02-07 to 1999-06-06
  • Armory Center for the Arts, 1999-02-07 to 1999-04-11
  • Art Center College of Design (Pasadena, Calif.), 1999-02-07 to 1999-04-25
  • Farrell, John, Pasadena Star News, p. 34
  • Pasadena Art Museum, An Exhibition of Works by Joseph Cornell, 1966, pp. 42-43, 64
  • Armory Center for the Arts/Art Center College of Design, Radical Past: Contemporary Art & Music in Pasadena, 1960-1974, 1999, p. 82
  • Sarah Lea, Roscoe Hartigan, Jasper Sharp and Ben Street, Joseph Cornell Wanderlust, 2015, Fig. 21 pp. 44-45
Read
Impressions: Assemblage as Poetry

Image reproduction permission may be granted for scholarly or arts related commercial use. All image requests, regardless of their intended purpose, should be submitted via the reproduction request form.

Images may be protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights. Additional permission may be required.

Approved requests for the reproduction of an image will receive a contract detailing all fees and conditions of use of the image. Upon receipt of both the signed contract and full payment, the Office of Rights and Reproductions will provide the image. A complimentary copy of the published material must be provided to the Norton Simon Museum.

Reproduction Request Form