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Wall hanging: Torn & Paradisträd (Tower and Paradise Tree)

Designed by: Stig Lindberg (Swedish, 1916–1982)
For: Nordiska Kompaniet's Textilkammare (Swedish)
Swedish
early 1950s
Object Place: Sweden

Medium/Technique Linen and cotton, plain weave, screen-printed
Dimensions Height x width: 86 x 49 1/2 in. (218.4 x 125.7 cm)
Credit Line Edwin E. Jack Fund
Accession Number2006.1860
NOT ON VIEW
ClassificationsTextiles
Stig Lindberg was a prolific, award-winning designer of ceramics and decorative patterns in the 1950s. His assured and idiosyncratic use of line, together with his sense of humor, sets his work apart from that of his contemporaries, and gives it a liveliness that continues to appeal to collectors today. Many of Lindberg's designs (such as "Lustgarden," also in the MFA's collection) have a smooth, free-flowing quality, but here he employs a distinct style, with heavy, spiky black outlines and high-contrast blocks of color. The large scale of the design, its bold and unusual color palette, and strong graphic appeal make it an excellent example of mid-20th-century design.

DescriptionPrinted wall hanging panel, entitled "Torn & Paradisträd" (Tower and Paradise Tree) (title sometimes given as "Livets träd" (Life's tree)). Screen-printed with bold stylized design of a flame-haired woman and a rooster standing underneath a large tree with figures, a birdcage, bird's nest, birds, church, and owl amongst the branches, steeple-like tower, and sun, all with heavy black outlines; motifs in raspberry-pink, blue, teal, yellow, brown, and beige on raspberry-pink ground with light and dark brown saw-tooth edge border; signed at lower right "Stig L." Hemmed sides, rod pockets at top and bottom.
Signed Stig L.
ProvenancePurchased in Sweden by Cora Gingsburg, LLC, April 2002; Purchased by the MFA, October 25, 2006.
Copyright© 2011 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / BUS, Stockholm.