{"id":2061821,"date":"2026-07-25T18:57:56","date_gmt":"2026-07-25T15:57:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2061821"},"modified":"2026-07-25T18:57:56","modified_gmt":"2026-07-25T15:57:56","slug":"italian-football-club-buys-44-archie-rand-works-for-corporate-collection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2061821","title":{"rendered":"Italian Football Club buys 44 Archie Rand Works for Corporate Collection."},"content":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/0021_262304_Archie-Rand-Photo-Christopher-Garcia-Valle.jpg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n

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\n\tFor decades, Archie Rand\u2018s\u00a0\u201cLetter Paintings\u201d series\u00a0has been something of a cult favorite among painters and critics. Now, 44 of them are heading to an unlikely home: the corporate collection of Italy\u2019s Modena FC.<\/p>\n

\n\tNew York\u2013based gallery Jarvis Art announced this week that the Italian football club has acquired the group of paintings, which Rand made between 1968 and 1971 while still a teenager. The series was shown in 1983 at the Museum of the Carnegie Institute and reunited in a 1991 exhibition at Exit Art in New York, where it earned a jazzy review from\u00a0New York Times<\/em>\u00a0critic Roberta Smith. The works have rarely been seen together since.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe paintings marked an early turning point for Rand. As a teenager, he apprenticed under painter Larry Poons and became an acolyte of the influential critic Clement Greenberg, who saw the young artist as part of the next generation of abstract painters. But instead of following that path to its logical conclusion, Rand veered off script. He began writing the names of the musicians, poets, artists, and public figures he loved across luminous abstract canvases, turning Color Field painting into something deeply personal.<\/p>\n

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Archie Rand, LaVern Baker<\/em>, 1969.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

\n\tLooking back years later, Rand described the works as \u201ctombstones for the unheralded.\u201d They were, he said, an attempt to paint something modern art had largely forgotten: love.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn her review, Smith argued the paintings deserved far more attention than they had received. She praised the way they fused the lush surfaces of Color Field painting with the language and references of Conceptual art, calling them works that balanced \u201creverence and irreverence.\u201d She went on to suggest they anticipated later developments ranging from New Image Painting to Jean-Michel Basquiat\u2019s use of musicians\u2019 names.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis acquisition of one of Archie\u2019s most prominent historical series, along with the great success of his recent show at the gallery,\u00a0Heads<\/em>, is a testament to the longevity of his work, not just today but throughout his career,\u201d said Lindsay Jarvis, founder of Jarvis Art.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

[analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/archie-rand-letter-paintings-modena-fc-acquisition-1234793377\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/0021_262304_Archie-Rand-Photo-Christopher-Garcia-Valle.jpg?w=1024″] For decades, Archie Rand\u2018s\u00a0\u201cLetter Paintings\u201d series\u00a0has been something of a cult favorite among painters and critics. Now, 44 of them are heading to an unlikely home: the corporate collection of Italy\u2019s Modena FC. New York\u2013based gallery Jarvis Art announced this week that the Italian football club has acquired the group of paintings, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-2061821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2061821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2061821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2061821\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2061821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2061821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2061821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}