Object Image

Too Soon for Thunder

Kay Sage, an American, was associated with the Surrealist movement, which explored the expression of an alternative reality through the unconscious mind and dream imagery. Too Soon for Thunder is a desolate landscape, filled with enigmatic, architectural motifs and draped, skeletal phantoms. Of a similar image Sage explained, "It's a sort of showing what's inside-things half mechanical, half alive. The mountain itself can represent almost anything-a human, life, the world, any fundamental thing…I do know that while I'm painting, I feel as though I am living in the place."

Bequest of the artist...

1943
Oil on canvas
28.1 x 36.0in
64-36
Text: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023
Image: Estate of Kay Sage / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Where you'll find this

Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
Permanent collection

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