Surf
1960 · Lithograph (brush and tusche) on ivory wove paper
57.3 × 72.7 cm (22 9/16 × 28 5/8 in.)
Art Institute of Chicago
WATTS INDEXThe canonical database of visual culture
Reuben Tam
American, 1916
Hawaii, USA
Printmaking
Representation
None documented
3
Institutional Exhibitions
4
Works in Collection
8
Assets Indexed
4
Authority-backed Facts
0
Publications Referenced
80%
Profile Completeness
Cultural Positioning
Movements
No movements recorded
Related Artists
No edges recorded
Influence Graph
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Selected Institutional Exhibitions
View all exhibitions →No image
Prints from Blocks: Gauguin to Now
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1983
No image
Recent Drawings U.S.A.
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1956
No image
Recent Acquisitions
Museum of Modern Art, New York
1949–1950
About
Why this artist matters now
Reuben Tam was an American painter and printmaker whose abstractions emerged from close observation of landscape and geology. Working primarily in oil and watercolor, he developed a vocabulary of layered, translucent forms that suggest mineral strata, erosion patterns, and atmospheric conditions without literal representation. Active from the 1940s onward, Tam's work bridges gestural abstraction and environmental inquiry, grounded in extended periods spent studying rock formations and geological processes across the American Southwest.
Source: Moma Bulk 2026 05 04 · Trust score: 92% · Updated 25d ago
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Medium
Printmaking
Related Artists
6 in graph
Institutional
Museum Collections
Canonical record
Artworks (4)
Record
Images
Related artists
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Record
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Institutional
Representation & Collections
In collection
Art Institute of Chicago
In collection
Museum of Modern Art
New York, US
Record