Beautiful Night

Louise Bourgeois

2004

Nine-color lithograph on music paper

Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston

Working in sculpture, drawing, and printmaking, Louise Bourgeois (Born 1911 in Paris; died 2010 in New York)—one of the twentieth century’s most celebrated artists—has explored themes such as trauma, sexuality, and everyday life. Beautiful Night is a nine-color lithograph depicting a boldly colored landscape of pink, orange, and red hills. Printed on music paper, the print is a buoyant and hopeful image, especially for an artist best known for delving into the darker aspects of life. This print retains Bourgeois’s graphic style. Here we see her signature mark-making, as in the mountains formed by her spiraling, obsessive lines and r