K. Shahi blogs about the exhibition Late Klee at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, on view through February 24, 2013.
Shahi writes: "In 1936, Klee was diagnosed with scleroderma, a chronic systemic autoimmune disease. Knowing that he was nearing the end of his life, Klee’s work took on a renewed sense of urgency. As the Metropolitan Museum describes, he began to work more quickly, his lines becoming heavier, forms more generalized, colors more simple and deliberate. Chronology is not the primary emphasis of “Late Klee;” the exhibition does not map a straightforward progression. Instead, the artist’s rapidly shifting experiments with form, color and composition reveal a creativity that was unimpeded – indeed, even abetted – by his impending death."
