Artwork
Untitled
Untitled is an ink print by Rosemarie Trockel. It dates from 2014 and is held in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art.
About this work
Overview
Its layered imagery and bold color scheme invite scrutiny of how identity and representation are constructed through fragmented visual sources.
Created in 2014, this screenprint by Rosemarie Trockel is part of The Museum of Modern Art’s collection. It combines photographic fragments with a vivid, striped ground, arranged in a deliberately unpolished composition. The work resists traditional print aesthetics, instead embracing the irregularity of collage. Its layered imagery and bold color scheme invite scrutiny of how identity and representation are constructed through fragmented visual sources.
Subject & Meaning
The image juxtaposes three distinct figures: two women in small black-and-white photos—one with a cat, another smiling—and a larger, centrally framed woman with dark hair, all set against patterned stripes. To the right, a man in a white shirt and sunglasses gazes directly, isolated on a plain white field. The arrangement suggests a commentary on gendered visibility, domesticity, and the performative nature of portraiture, without offering clear narrative resolution.
Technique & Style
Trockel used screenprinting to replicate the look of a handmade collage, layering cut-out photographs onto a bright, geometric background of yellow, blue, and orange stripes. The edges of the images remain uneven, preserving the tactile quality of tape and scissors. This deliberate mimicry of amateur assembly challenges the precision expected in fine art printing, emphasizing process over polish.
History & Provenance
The work entered The Museum of Modern Art’s collection shortly after its creation in 2014. It reflects Trockel’s ongoing engagement with mass-produced imagery and domestic motifs, themes present since the 1980s. While no prior exhibition history is widely documented, its acquisition by MoMA situates it within a broader institutional recognition of her conceptual approach to printmaking and feminist critique.
Context
Trockel’s practice in the 2010s continued to interrogate gender roles through everyday visual materials, often drawing from advertising, domestic crafts, and media imagery. This print aligns with her use of knitting patterns and photographic collage to disrupt traditional hierarchies in art. The striped background echoes her earlier textile works, while the fragmented portraits reflect broader cultural anxieties about representation and control.
Legacy
This work contributes to Trockel’s sustained exploration of how images shape perception of identity, particularly female subjectivity. By foregrounding the artificiality of collage and the instability of photographic meaning, she resists fixed interpretations. Her influence is evident in contemporary practices that treat print media as a site of cultural negotiation rather than documentation.
Artist & collection
Artist
Rosemarie Trockel is a German conceptual artist. She has made drawings, paintings, sculptures, videos and installations, and has worked in mixed media. From 1985, she made pictures using knitting-machines. She is a…
