About this artwork
A magnified spider’s web is illustrated in 'Web Ladder'. Celmins has focused on its delicate, grid-like structure and the small irregularities which interrupt it. This image is one of a suite of five mezzotint prints that Celmins made in 2010 exploring the similarities between micro- and macrocosmic worlds. The other four prints in the series are 'Reverse Galaxy', 'Falling Stars', 'Divided Night Sky' and 'Dark Galaxy'. She has compared the minute detail and obsessive precision in her own work with that of a spider creating a web, saying: "I identify with the spider: I’m the kind of person who works on something forever and works on the same image again the next day".
Updated before 2020
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artist:Vija Celmins (born 1938) American
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title:Web Ladder
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date created:2010
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materials:Mezzotint on paper
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measurements:plate: 30.20 x 20.80 cm (paper 41.70 x 29.90 cm); Framed: 45.70 × 33.50 × 3.70 cm
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object type:
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credit line:ARTIST ROOMS National Galleries of Scotland and Tate. Presented by the artist 2010
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accession number:AR01155
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gallery:
Vija Celmins
Vija Celmins
Born in Latvia in 1938, Celmins and her family emigrated to the United States in 1948. Although beginning her career as an Abstract Expressionist painter, she is now best known for her intricate, monochromatic drawings of a select range of subjects. In 1966 she began to use photographs as the...
