The composition "Reclining Nude" began as a drawing that David Alfaro Siqueiros made in 1931 of his companion the Uruguayan poet Blanca Luz Brum. Its intermingling, three-dimensional forms seem to oscillate between stone sculpture and human flesh. At the time, Siqueiros was living in the remote and mountainous mining town of Taxco, where he was exiled after being arrested at a May Day demonstration and sentenced to six months in prison. Although Siqueiros had little there in the way of printmaking resources, he was able to create four lithographs, thanks to his friendship with the American artist William Spratling, an agent for the Weyhe Gallery. Spratling sent this composition along with three other drawings by Siqueiros to New York, where they were transferred to and printed from lithographic plates by the American printer George Miller. The impressions were sent to Siqueiros in Mexico to sign before roughly half were returned to New York for sale and exhibition.