(Space Rose)

Mark Tobey

This early color intaglio is an exact replication of the oil painting "Space Rose" which is illustrated in black and white as plate 65 in Wieland Schmied's catalog "Tobey," Harry N. Abrams for Meridian Books.

This appears to be a collaborative effort between Tobey and printmaker/printer Marcel Fiorini who was experimenting with intaglio methods in Paris in the late 1950s and had worked with a number of artists to create books and portfolios. His name is in the lower left of the plate of this print: "Fiorini Sculps" (short for "Sculpsit", Latin for 'engraved it'). It is likely that Fiorini and Tobey worked together to create the matrix, which was then printed by Fiorini and signed and numbered by Tobey.

This print is very rare, there are no auction records for it and no institutions that we can find. In 1979 Paul Cummings and Jane Haslem Gallery put together the closest thing to a raisonné but listed his first print as 1955 and then 2 lithographs in 1961. This print was not included. Jane Haslem states that "We ran into several problems. There was a fire which destroyed a number of Tobey's prints." It is possible that this edition was amongst those destroyed.