Graves’ interest in a wide range of disciplines—such as natural history and scientific observation—is evident in her Indian Ocean Floor series, inspired by bathymetric maps of the ocean’s depths along the Indian coastline that were circulated in National Geographic and Life magazines.
In this work, Graves depicted nearly 3,000 miles of below the ocean using a pointillist technique, transforming the original source material into a her unique visual language. While maps are commonly understood as systems for recording documenting distance and space, Graves saw them as both representations of data and abstractions of knowledge. Her paintings amplify this idea by translating geographic information recordings into layered fields of dots. At the time—and still today—the ocean’s depths retained a sense of mystery, only partially accessible through scientific exploration. For Graves, the ocean floor functioned like a living fossil, shaped over eons and bearing the traces of powerful currents and the countless organisms that inhabited its depths.
Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY, Nancy Graves: A Survey, 1969/1980 5/3/1980. Additional Venues: Akron Art Institute, Akron, OH, July 5-August 31, 1980; Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX, September 20-October 26, 1980; Brooks Memorial Art Gallery, Memphis, TN, November 15-January 6, 1981; Neuberger Museum, State University of New York College at Purchase, Purchase, NY, January 25-March 15, 1981; Des Moines Art Center, Des Moines, IA, March 30-May 3, 1981; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, May 31-July 12, 1981
Knoedler Gallery, Ltd., London, United Kingdom, Nancy Graves 4/8/1987.
Sotheby's Arcade, New York, NY, Modern and Contemporary Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture 2/24/1994.
Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York, USA, Nancy Graves: Mapping 2/21/2019 - 4/4/2019
The Art Collection of First City National Bank of Houston, Houston, TX, 1973, n.p., illus.
Modern and Contemporary Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture, Sotheby's Arcade, New York, NY, February 1994, Lot 424 illus.
Bannon, Anthony., Graves' Work Celebrates the Mind, The Buffalo News, May 3, 1980, .
Belloli, Jay, Sebastien Adler and Nancy Graves., , Nancy Graves, La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla, CA, 1973, pp. 8, cat. no. 3 and 14 illus.
Carr, Carolyn Kinder., , Nancy Graves: A Survey 1969-1980: Observations and . . . discussion of sculpture, Dialogue: The Ohio Arts Journal, Munroe Falls, Ohio, July/August 1980, p. 18.
Cathcart, Linda L., , Nancy Graves: A Survey, 1969/1980, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY, 1980, pp. 21, 32, cat no. 16 and 52 illus..
Channin, Richard., , Nancy Graves: Map Paintings, Art International: The Lugano Review, November 15, 1974, p. 26 illus.
Graves, Nancy, , Nancy Graves: Excerpts from Notebooks, Artscribe, April 1979, p. 40.
La Badie, Donald, , Real world is the springboard for creations of Nancy Graves, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, TN, November 16, 1980, p. 26.
Ratcliff, Carter, Nancy Graves: A World of Metaphors, Nancy Graves: Synedoche II, Locks Art Publications, Philadelphia, PA USA 2022, p. 8, essay.
Schwartzman, Allan, , All nature is but art unknown: From ocean floor to lunar sea, sculptor/painter/film maker Nancy Graves reconsiders the universe, Vassar Quarterly, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY, winter 1981, p. 22 illus.
Storr, Robert, Nancy Graves: Back to Nature, Nancy Graves: Mapping, Mitchell Innes & Nash, New York USA , p. 29, illus.x