Eugene Masselink
American (b. South Africa), 1910 – 1962
Eight-fold Screen, 1956
Stained walnut with paint and gilt
93 x 149 inches
Museum Purchase
2006.28

Born in Capetown, South Africa, Eugene Masselink moved with his family to Grand Rapids where he attended Central High School. In 1933, after receiving a degree in architecture from Ohio State University, Masselink was invited to join Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin Fellowship in Spring Green, Wisconsin. He served as Wright's personal assistant and became a highly respected graphic designer for the office, eventually working with Wright on decorative elements for the interiors of houses.

In 1956, Elizabeth Gordon, editor of House Beautiful, commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright to redesign portions of the interior of her home in Dobbs Ferry, New York. Masselink designed this screen for the master bedroom. Wright's passion for Japanese art, shared by Masselink, inspired the use of decorative screens and wall panels in many commissions. Masselink painted this screen by hand and utilized gold leaf to create a highly decorative and dynamically modern pattern of leaves and other organic forms that epitomizes mid-century American Modernist design. He created only about a dozen screens and often used Wright's floor plans for inspiration. At the same time that Masselink produced this screen, Wright was completing his design for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. The unique Eight-fold Screen is the centerpiece of the Grand Rapids Art Museum's Design and Modern Craft Gallery.