WattsOS
O
Offerings
1957 · Brush and black ink wash and gold leaf on paper
43 in. × 24 1/2 in. (109.2 × 62.2 cm)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
WATTS INDEXThe canonical database of visual culture
Morris Graves
Artist
DrawingExpressionism
Representation
None documented
33
Institutional Exhibitions
29
Works in Collection
51
Assets Indexed
0
Authority-backed Facts
0
Publications Referenced
90%
Profile Completeness
Cultural Positioning
Movements
- • Expressionism
Related Artists
No edges recorded
Influence Graph
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Selected Institutional Exhibitions
View all exhibitions →No image
Watercolors: Selections from the Permanent Collection
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1989
No image
A Penthouse Aviary
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1980–1981
No image
Gifts of Drawing
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1979
No image
The Stage Show
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1979
No image
The Natural Paradise: Painting in America 1800�1950
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1976
About
Why this artist matters now
Morris Graves was an American painter whose works combined abstraction with naturalistic observation of birds, insects, and aquatic life. Working primarily in gouache and watercolor on paper, he developed a lyrical, introspective visual language that emerged from his engagement with Pacific Northwest landscape and Asian aesthetics. Active from the 1930s through the 1990s, Graves pursued a sustained inquiry into the relationship between consciousness and the natural world, resisting both pure abstraction and literal representation.
Source: Moma Bulk 2026 05 04 · Trust score: 92% · Updated 25d ago
Graph relationships
Taste overlap and adjacency
Movement
Expressionism
Medium
Drawing
Related Artists
12 in graph
Institutional
Museum Collections
Canonical record
Artworks (29)
View all 29 artworks →
Record
Images
Related artists
Adjacent in the graph
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Marsden Hartley
Shared movement
Hugo Gellert
Shared movement
Alfred Jensen
Also drawing
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Juan Muñoz
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Victor Jean Nicolle
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Johann Heinrich Lips
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William Young Ottley
Also drawing
Record
Movements and affiliations
Institutional
Representation & Collections
In collection
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
In collection
Cleveland Museum of Art
In collection
Museum of Modern Art
New York, US
In collection
Art Institute of Chicago
Market
Auction sale history
Houses that have sold works by this artist at auction
Record