Recto, lower left: Motherwell

University of California, Berkeley Art Museum. Gift of Renee and David McKee

Private collection, ca. 1971; University of California, Berkeley Art Museum, 2001

This work belongs to the I.H. Series (W315–W339), which was painted over proofs of a lithograph printed by Irwin Hollander (the “I.H.” referred to in the title) in 1967 (Engberg and Banach 2003, no. 56). Motherwell first reworked the print images with brush and black ink, and then painted some with various colors of acrylic paint. A number of works in this series became the basis for the Basque Suite screen prints that were published by Marlborough Graphics (Engberg and Banach 2003, nos. 79–88). Some of the works in the I.H. series were later given Basque Suite titles, some were left untitled, and a torn fragment of a work that had formerly been I.H. Series No. 3 was later incorporated into a collage (see C705). As a result there are gaps in the numbering of the series.
The I.H. series also includes a number of drawings, done in black ink over the same lithographic image, but not worked further with paint.