Kay Sage and Tomorrow is Never

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Kay Sage
(Image from wikiart.org)

Sage, Kay. Tomorrow is Never. 1955,
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 
(Image from wikiart.org)

Artist Background

    Kay Sage was an American painter born in 1898 in Albany, NY. As a child, she spent a lot of time traveling and living abroad in Europe with her mother after her parents divorced. During her time in Europe, she became fond of drawing, writing, and painting. Once she moved back to the United States, she attended the Corcoran Art School in Washington, D.C. A large amount of her art is a part of the cultural movement of Surrealism, which took place in the modern art period. Her pieces are intense, vivid, and capture a great deal of depth. One common motif throughout her pieces, which exists in Tomorrow is Never, is a flowing cloth or drape. 

Artwork Background

    Tomorrow is Never was painted in 1955, just months after Sage's husband Yves Tanguy suddenly died. The piece seems to be reflective of the grief and depression that Sage experienced after the event. The piece is of a foggy, dreary landscape. Lattice-like towers seem to stretch high into the sky due to the surrounding fog that appear almost as clouds. The further away the tower is, the less visible and clear it is to the viewer. Though the towers existing in the background are more difficult to see than those in the foreground, their existence provides a sense of depth to the piece. Each tower shows a flowing cloth encased within its bars. The use of the cloth is a common motif in Sage's work. Another example can be seen below. 

Sage, Kay. I Saw Three Cities. 1944,
Princeton University Art Museum.
(Image from Princeton University Art Museum website)



Elements and Principles of Design

    The painting exudes feelings of dread and entrapment through the use of space, color, and movement. Besides the towers, the landscape is open. The area surrounding the towers is barren and empty, leaving a great deal of open space that is not used. Not much else exists in this place that Sage is showing. But it is the emphasis on the tall, peculiar towers that creates the feeling of entrapment. Because nothing else exists within the piece, there is no way to escape them.  The color that makes up these towers, and the empty space around them, is eerie as well. Though in the middle, there seems to be an indication of light, it is mostly suffocated by light grays and light browns. The towers closest to the viewer show the darkest colors of the piece. The viewers eyes follow the movement of the towers, as they extend into the background. This also creates the feeling of entrapment, as the viewers eye continue to move and simultaneously find more towers. The title seems to be of great importance as well and confirms these sensations of entrapment and dread. As the website The Art Story puts it: "There is no future, hence no past, just the very present of this intense isolation and heavy grief."

Analysis and Relationship to Modern Art Movement 

    The painting is assumed to be an intense self-reflection on Sage's "sense of lonliness and isolation" following Tanguy's death, as stated by The Art Story. Therefore, it reflects greatly on Sage's personal experiences, which is distinctive of the modern art period. However, it is also aligned with the Surrealism movement. According to the Tate website, surrealism focused greatly on dream-like pieces, that may have no real structure or objects of no clear relevance to the viewer, but that are structured and relevant to the artists unconscious. Tomorrow is Never mostly matches this description, although pieces by other surrealist artists like Salvador Dalí seem more in line with surrealism because of how strange his pieces typically are. However, as viewers, we can never really understand the meaning of these towers, the trapped cloths, and the dreary fog. This, in essence, is characteristic of surrealism in that Sage's unconscious is really at work in the piece. 

Reader Questions: How does this piece make you feel? Was it initially visually striking or confusing?

Other Sources Used




                                   

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