Andy Warhol’s Lamentation (1986) belongs to his Martha Graham portfolio, made in the last year of his life and among the final print projects he finished. Graham (1894–1991) is widely regarded as the central figure in American modern dance, and Warhol gave her the same treatment as the American icons of his late series Ads, Myths and Cowboys and Indians.

The source is Barbara Morgan’s photograph of Graham in Lamentation, her 1930 solo in which she performed entirely encased in a tube of purple jersey — one of the most recognized images in modern dance. Seated with her head bowed, she pulls the fabric taut across her body in long diagonal folds, one fist pressing outward against it. Warhol keeps the palette cool and spare: pale lavender against black, traced with electric blue lines that follow each stretch of cloth.

The restraint suits the dance. Compressed and almost totemic, her figure turns grief into something closer to sculpture, and Warhol lets that stillness carry the print. Because he died within months of completing the suite, it holds real biographical weight. This impression, number 78 from the edition of 100, is printed on Lenox Museum Board at 36 inches square.