- Title
- The Big Steal #1
- Date Made
- 1962-1963
- Medium
- Oil and assemblage on canvas
- Dimensions
- 43 5/8 × 41 in. (110.81 × 104.14 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.83.210.5
- Collecting Area
- Modern Art
- Curatorial Notes
Daniel LaRue Johnson’s The Big Steal #1 is an early example of the artist’s Black Constructions, which comprises found objects such as mouse traps, broken figurines, wire fencing, and various pieces of ephemera arranged in the center of square wooden boxes and coated in black paint or tar. Made in Los Angeles between 1961 and 1965 during the height of the Civil Rights movement, these assemblages reference the systemic racism and violence towards Black Americans that marked the era. Here, five mouse traps form a cross, with a disembodied doll hand caught in the largest of the spring-loaded metal snares. Set within a painted black circle and a wrinkled paper square, these multiple framing devices reinforce a sense of entrapment.
Wall label, 2021.
