Die drei Pierrots Nr. 2 (The Three Pierrots No. 2)
Albert Bloch
American, 1882-1961
Oil on canvas (1911)

"Die drei Pierrots Nr. 2 features pantomime figures from the commedia dell'arte, a style of improvisational comedic theater developed in 16th- and 17th-century Italy. Aspiring to evoke a range of emotional states, Albert Bloch superimposed three images of Pierrot, an outsider character in the commedia, with whom many modern artists identified. By reducing the figures to abstract shapes and layering their forms against a colorful abstract background, Bloch created an especially dynamic composition.

St. Louis native Albert Bloch spent more than a decade in Germany beginning in 1908. In Munich in 1911, he was the only American invited to participate in the first exhibition of the avant-garde Blue Rider group. Die drei Pierrots Nr. 2 was one of Bloch's six entries."

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