The collection
Textile with rectangles of red, blue, and yellow separated by black lines.
1947

Drapery Textile

Designed by
Charles Edmund Rossbach (1914–2002)
Material
Cotton
Produced by
Charles Edmund Rossbach
Dimensions
223.7 x 93 cm

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Liliane and David M. Stewart Collection, gift of the designer, D85.164.1

While he was a student at the Cranbrook Academy of Art, Rossbach created this colorful geometric textile by dyeing the threads of the design on the loom as he wove it. Abstract paintings by Piet Mondrian were his inspiration, and the design calls to mind a stained-glass window with heavy leading.

Student experimentation was encouraged at Cranbrook, and Rossbach continued to think independently and try new techniques throughout his life, which led to a career as a professor of design at the University of California.

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, photo: Giles Rivest.