Art 1985-1989
1985 Rubber by Basquiat
2020 SOLD for £ 7.5M by Sotheby's
The art of Jean-Michel Basquiat is political, and he is a remarkable connoisseur of the history of slavery. During 1981 and most of 1982, he had also been an entertainer, basing many works on street life including the hide and seek game with the cops.
From the start, he uses words that imitate the tags. The bourgeois see it as an irreverent complement to the illustration, but the message is often subtle and well targeted. Pollo Frito, painted in 1982, is a direct reference to the living conditions of the slaves in the south of the United States. This diptych was sold for $ 25.7M by Sotheby's on November 14, 2018.
In 1983 he internationalizes his vision by castigating the slavery of black people in antique Egypt, a social fact deliberately forgotten by most historians. The word NILE is half crossed out, like a lie that generates a critical question : is today's society, based on consumerism, creating new forms of slavery which are once again denied by the bourgeoisie ?
In the last phase of his short career, the theme of slavery takes an increasingly obsessive place.
On February 11, 2020, Sotheby's sold for £ 7.5M Rubber, acrylic, oil stick and collage on canvas 220 x 173 cm made in 1985, lot 8.
The dominant colors are blazing red and orange, and the flames of hell appear repeatedly. The only word is RUBBER, inscribed with a great clarity. In the 1880s and the following decades throughout the Amazon rainforest, the rubber boom (ciclo da borracha) marks a resurgence of slavery in its most atrocious conditions, to meet the new needs of the consumer society.
Rubber is dominated by a much stylized black head with mouth and empty eyes lit from behind, mounted on a barrel which can serve as a lamp. The figure has no limbs but the flame closest to that head is shaped like a hand coming out of an incandescent lava pool.
Jim Crow, a direct reference to a former racial discrimination in Mississippi, features a similar figure, excepted that the barrel has retrieved two helpless arms and three pairs of ribs. This acrylic and oil stick on wooden parquet 205 x 244 x 4 cm executed in 1986 was sold for € 15M by Christie's on October 20, 2017.
From the start, he uses words that imitate the tags. The bourgeois see it as an irreverent complement to the illustration, but the message is often subtle and well targeted. Pollo Frito, painted in 1982, is a direct reference to the living conditions of the slaves in the south of the United States. This diptych was sold for $ 25.7M by Sotheby's on November 14, 2018.
In 1983 he internationalizes his vision by castigating the slavery of black people in antique Egypt, a social fact deliberately forgotten by most historians. The word NILE is half crossed out, like a lie that generates a critical question : is today's society, based on consumerism, creating new forms of slavery which are once again denied by the bourgeoisie ?
In the last phase of his short career, the theme of slavery takes an increasingly obsessive place.
On February 11, 2020, Sotheby's sold for £ 7.5M Rubber, acrylic, oil stick and collage on canvas 220 x 173 cm made in 1985, lot 8.
The dominant colors are blazing red and orange, and the flames of hell appear repeatedly. The only word is RUBBER, inscribed with a great clarity. In the 1880s and the following decades throughout the Amazon rainforest, the rubber boom (ciclo da borracha) marks a resurgence of slavery in its most atrocious conditions, to meet the new needs of the consumer society.
Rubber is dominated by a much stylized black head with mouth and empty eyes lit from behind, mounted on a barrel which can serve as a lamp. The figure has no limbs but the flame closest to that head is shaped like a hand coming out of an incandescent lava pool.
Jim Crow, a direct reference to a former racial discrimination in Mississippi, features a similar figure, excepted that the barrel has retrieved two helpless arms and three pairs of ribs. This acrylic and oil stick on wooden parquet 205 x 244 x 4 cm executed in 1986 was sold for € 15M by Christie's on October 20, 2017.
1985 The Yellow Fingers of the Artist by Dumas
2017 SOLD for $ 3.6M by Phillips
In 1985 in Amsterdam the Galerie Paul Andriesse devotes to Marlene Dumas a solo exhibition entitled The Eyes of the Night Creatures.
The South African born Dumas was then established since ten years in Holland where she had studied art and also psychology. Her friends from the Amsterdam's art communities are interesting in their nightlife, their vices and their disarray.
Under poor lighting the faces are pale and unhealthy. The people of the night counterbalance their banality by their desire for pleasure. Their portraits painted by Dumas far beyond life size anticipate by a few years the expression of the real ugliness by Young British Artists including Jenny Saville. She works from photographs like Francis Bacon had done.
On November 16, 2017, Phillips sold for $ 3.6M from a lower estimate of $ 2.2M an oil on linen 125 x 211 cm painted in 1985 by Marlene Dumas, lot 13. Titled The Yellow Fingers of the Artist, it had been exhibited in the group of the Eyes of the Night Creatures.
This artwork is a diptych consisting of two portraits on a black background. The two characters look ahead and ignore each other like Munch's loners. On the left, the man dazed by the night has his fingers yellowed by fresh paint but also by the abuse of tobacco. On the right the young woman who is an assistant to Andriesse has her eyes too wide open and hides her mouth behind a glass of red wine.
The South African born Dumas was then established since ten years in Holland where she had studied art and also psychology. Her friends from the Amsterdam's art communities are interesting in their nightlife, their vices and their disarray.
Under poor lighting the faces are pale and unhealthy. The people of the night counterbalance their banality by their desire for pleasure. Their portraits painted by Dumas far beyond life size anticipate by a few years the expression of the real ugliness by Young British Artists including Jenny Saville. She works from photographs like Francis Bacon had done.
On November 16, 2017, Phillips sold for $ 3.6M from a lower estimate of $ 2.2M an oil on linen 125 x 211 cm painted in 1985 by Marlene Dumas, lot 13. Titled The Yellow Fingers of the Artist, it had been exhibited in the group of the Eyes of the Night Creatures.
This artwork is a diptych consisting of two portraits on a black background. The two characters look ahead and ignore each other like Munch's loners. On the left, the man dazed by the night has his fingers yellowed by fresh paint but also by the abuse of tobacco. On the right the young woman who is an assistant to Andriesse has her eyes too wide open and hides her mouth behind a glass of red wine.
1985 Jumping into the New Wave
2015 SOLD for HK$ 16.6M including premium
2015 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the 85 New Wave in China with its unprecedented artistic and cultural revival four years before the protests in Tiananmen Square.
The 1985 movement is multiple, with groups of artists in all major cities. The common point is their total opposition to the official art of political propaganda. The corollary is the expression by painting of new messages resolutely inspired by the contradictions of modern life. The groups communicate together and the first major exhibitions, wandering or located, are managed before the end of that first year.
The new wave of 1985 came out of nothingness. It was previously impossible for an artist to acquire the necessary equipment and such a situation was as effective for the central government as the implementation of its severe censorship. The underground art under Maoism and early post-Maoism was indeed of poor technical quality and the permanent threat against the artists had concentrated their creativity on political claiming.
Zhang Peili led the group of Hangzhou. He appreciated the risk of sentimentality. The faces of his characters are blurred or erased, not allowing the likeness to a real person nor the expression of an emotion or even of an impassivity, on the opposite to Zhang Xiaogang for example. He probably contributed to inspire the hidden portraits of Zeng Fanzhi.
In 1985, Zhang Peili painted bathers in a pool, ready to jump, or swimming, or floating. The water-filled basin is the new world that welcomes their future.
On October 5 in Hong Kong, Poly Auction sells Midsummer Swimmers, lot 209 shown on the third page of the press release. This oil on canvas 173 x 170 cm, a very large size for this artist, was selected for the seminal exhibition of his group in December 1985 in Hangzhou. The four young men in bathing suits symbolize the four founders of the group.
Zhang Peili's career as a painter was short. Seeking more up-to-date means of expression, he is considered since 1994 as the pioneer and master of Chinese video art.
The 1985 movement is multiple, with groups of artists in all major cities. The common point is their total opposition to the official art of political propaganda. The corollary is the expression by painting of new messages resolutely inspired by the contradictions of modern life. The groups communicate together and the first major exhibitions, wandering or located, are managed before the end of that first year.
The new wave of 1985 came out of nothingness. It was previously impossible for an artist to acquire the necessary equipment and such a situation was as effective for the central government as the implementation of its severe censorship. The underground art under Maoism and early post-Maoism was indeed of poor technical quality and the permanent threat against the artists had concentrated their creativity on political claiming.
Zhang Peili led the group of Hangzhou. He appreciated the risk of sentimentality. The faces of his characters are blurred or erased, not allowing the likeness to a real person nor the expression of an emotion or even of an impassivity, on the opposite to Zhang Xiaogang for example. He probably contributed to inspire the hidden portraits of Zeng Fanzhi.
In 1985, Zhang Peili painted bathers in a pool, ready to jump, or swimming, or floating. The water-filled basin is the new world that welcomes their future.
On October 5 in Hong Kong, Poly Auction sells Midsummer Swimmers, lot 209 shown on the third page of the press release. This oil on canvas 173 x 170 cm, a very large size for this artist, was selected for the seminal exhibition of his group in December 1985 in Hangzhou. The four young men in bathing suits symbolize the four founders of the group.
Zhang Peili's career as a painter was short. Seeking more up-to-date means of expression, he is considered since 1994 as the pioneer and master of Chinese video art.
1985 Homage to the Life by Keith Haring
2014 SOLD 1.54 M£ including premium
The late twentieth century saw the recognition of street artists. Keith Haring was one of the most prolific, using all materials and all formats to spread his activist message. Died of AIDS at 32 in 1990, he became the best symbol of anti-homophobic art.
His world is teeming with figures often repeated and perfectly recognizable in a cheerful and sexual mood. Despite the impossible links between the bodies and their monstrous deformations, his drawing inspired by graffiti is too simple to climb to the highest level of the art market.
In 1985 one of his friends died accidentally at age 20. Keith chooses for her memory the theme of the tree of life.
Drawing a tree is one of the basics of psycho-technical analysis. The branches of Keith's tree do not extend in leaves but in humanoid shapes which spring to life with vitality. In the foreground, four faceless characters sing an incantation in a wild celebration akin to the voodoo universe of Wifredo Lam.
This monumental acrylic on canvas 294 x 362 cm was sold for $ 2.17 million including premium by Sotheby's on 14 November 2007. It is estimated £ 1M for sale by Christie's in London on July 1, lot 34.
ADDENDUM
We have been informed by a message on twitter that the friend for whom he painted it was Maria Bonnier, killed in a car accident at 15 years old.
His world is teeming with figures often repeated and perfectly recognizable in a cheerful and sexual mood. Despite the impossible links between the bodies and their monstrous deformations, his drawing inspired by graffiti is too simple to climb to the highest level of the art market.
In 1985 one of his friends died accidentally at age 20. Keith chooses for her memory the theme of the tree of life.
Drawing a tree is one of the basics of psycho-technical analysis. The branches of Keith's tree do not extend in leaves but in humanoid shapes which spring to life with vitality. In the foreground, four faceless characters sing an incantation in a wild celebration akin to the voodoo universe of Wifredo Lam.
This monumental acrylic on canvas 294 x 362 cm was sold for $ 2.17 million including premium by Sotheby's on 14 November 2007. It is estimated £ 1M for sale by Christie's in London on July 1, lot 34.
ADDENDUM
We have been informed by a message on twitter that the friend for whom he painted it was Maria Bonnier, killed in a car accident at 15 years old.
1985 The Nijinsky Hare
2009 sold 505 K£ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Contemporary art must attract the public eyes from far away. The statues should be large and bizarre. The British sculptor Barry Flanagan has specialized in anthropomorphic hares.
In nature, this animal dances, jumps, spins, starts in every direction, is elusive ... as Nijinsky was one hundred years ago. The Nijinsky Hare of Flanagan, in bronze, 2.44 m high, designed in 1985, is a contortionist. Its long ears look like a glider, and he raises its leg like a French cancan dancer.
On 17 November 2006, Christie's had estimated at £ 200 K a copy of gray-green patina. The price reached 620 K £ including premium.
Sotheby's knows that one price is not enough to establish a value. For another copy, let us start with a reasonable £ 180 K, in London on June 26. As in the fable of the hare and the tortoise, this bronze whimsical character did not come to push the door of the prestige auction sale, which takes place the night before.
POST SALE COMMENT
Very good result for this bronze, K £ 505 premium included, confirming that the high price recorded by Christie's in 2006 was no accident. Moreover, the price of an object at auction is never a chance in the opinion that I am working to assess.
Contemporary art must attract the public eyes from far away. The statues should be large and bizarre. The British sculptor Barry Flanagan has specialized in anthropomorphic hares.
In nature, this animal dances, jumps, spins, starts in every direction, is elusive ... as Nijinsky was one hundred years ago. The Nijinsky Hare of Flanagan, in bronze, 2.44 m high, designed in 1985, is a contortionist. Its long ears look like a glider, and he raises its leg like a French cancan dancer.
On 17 November 2006, Christie's had estimated at £ 200 K a copy of gray-green patina. The price reached 620 K £ including premium.
Sotheby's knows that one price is not enough to establish a value. For another copy, let us start with a reasonable £ 180 K, in London on June 26. As in the fable of the hare and the tortoise, this bronze whimsical character did not come to push the door of the prestige auction sale, which takes place the night before.
POST SALE COMMENT
Very good result for this bronze, K £ 505 premium included, confirming that the high price recorded by Christie's in 2006 was no accident. Moreover, the price of an object at auction is never a chance in the opinion that I am working to assess.
1986 Stowaway by de Kooning
2021 SOLD for $ 7.2M by Sotheby's
Throughout his career, Willem de Kooning resolutely set himself apart from all schools. At his beginnings, he removes the border between figurative and abstraction. In the 1970s, shapes and colors become abundant. In the 1980s, they are simplified without becoming minimalist. The formats remain very large, at the limits of the physical possibilities of the aging artist.
On April 19, 2021, Sotheby's sold for HK $ 47M the Untitled XLVIII of 1983, lot 1109. On this canvas 224 x 196 cm, the artist arranged undulating shapes in two pure colors, red and yellow. The overall effect might be reminiscent of Kandinsky's late passion for microbiology. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
Seen more closely, the individual coherence of forms disappears. The yellow is bordered with red, but not everywhere. The space between two yellow elements becomes a ribbon. The yellow element at the bottom left is partially hollowed out. The red lines are broken, with a false invitation to connect the segments. The stretched red shapes carry reflections, which bring a three-dimensional illusion in contradiction with microbiology.
The artist is indeed not a follower of Kandinsky, Mondrian or Matisse. We may try a comparison with his compatriot Escher : De Kooning has transferred the impossibility of forms into a total abstraction.
On May 12, 2021 in New York, Sotheby's sold for $ 7.2M Stowaway, oil on canvas 203 x 178 cm painted by de Kooning in 1986, lot 116. Its characteristics are similar to 1983-XLVIII but the forms are more intricated and the contrasts of colors are more subtle.
The title reminds that de Kooning first arrived in New York 60 years earlier after having traveled from the Netherlands as a stowaway on a ship.
On April 19, 2021, Sotheby's sold for HK $ 47M the Untitled XLVIII of 1983, lot 1109. On this canvas 224 x 196 cm, the artist arranged undulating shapes in two pure colors, red and yellow. The overall effect might be reminiscent of Kandinsky's late passion for microbiology. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
Seen more closely, the individual coherence of forms disappears. The yellow is bordered with red, but not everywhere. The space between two yellow elements becomes a ribbon. The yellow element at the bottom left is partially hollowed out. The red lines are broken, with a false invitation to connect the segments. The stretched red shapes carry reflections, which bring a three-dimensional illusion in contradiction with microbiology.
The artist is indeed not a follower of Kandinsky, Mondrian or Matisse. We may try a comparison with his compatriot Escher : De Kooning has transferred the impossibility of forms into a total abstraction.
On May 12, 2021 in New York, Sotheby's sold for $ 7.2M Stowaway, oil on canvas 203 x 178 cm painted by de Kooning in 1986, lot 116. Its characteristics are similar to 1983-XLVIII but the forms are more intricated and the contrasts of colors are more subtle.
The title reminds that de Kooning first arrived in New York 60 years earlier after having traveled from the Netherlands as a stowaway on a ship.
1986 The Last Preaching of Andy Warhol
2014 SOLD 61 MSEK including premium
Ondrej and Julia Varhola, the parents of Andy, had emigrated to the United States. They came from a village in present-day Slovakia and were deeply Catholic.
Andy's personality was very complex, but the real thread was his fear of God and death. Even at the time of his greater social activity, the basics of his character were never freed from shyness. He could not become a preacher, but he wanted to spread his vision of the vanity of things in life. He was an artist. He was even the most important artist of his time.
His relationship with the Catholic religion remained intense without becoming conventional. Too shy to go to confession, he fled ceremonies but liked to attend in person, anonymously, the charity to the poor of New York. He was carrying parcels and served coffee and meals.
In 1986, he finds a true model for his life. This is Leonardo's Last Supper. Throughout that year, he reinterprets it in the Warholian fashion, creating about forty works including details, multiples and even camouflages.
He worked intensively on the model, up to challenge the original Leonardo, too much modified and damaged. Warhol's Last Supper is inspired by drawings of experts in search of the initial features of the work. Andy got the anxiety that the public and the critics do not understand how much his interpretation of Leonardo's Last Supper was a serious work although he had spent his life in a continuous mockery of modern civilization.
The exhibition of 20 Last Suppers in Milan on January 22, 1987 was a triumph. Sitting in front of a simple Formica table, Andy signed autographs. Sick and exhausted, he had to interrupt his stay. Warhol died of the consequences of his creative act, like Van Gogh, De Staël and Klein.
A multiple of a detail of the Last Supper, Christ 112 times yellow, 2 x 10.7 m, was sold for $ 9.5 million including premium by Sotheby's on May 14, 2008.
Varying the colors from a work to another according to his usual practice, the double Last Supper 102 x 102 cm is the most common version. One of them was sold for $ 6.8 million including premium by Sotheby's on November 9, 2010. Another double Supper in same size is estimated SEK 60M, for sale on May 14 by Bukowskis in Stockholm.
I urge you to read the catalog issued by Bukowskis, which includes a fascinating study on the relation of Andy Warhol with religion.
I invite you to play the video shared by the auction house.
POST SALE COMMENT
This interesting Warhol painting has not reached its estimate but it was sold : SEK 61M including premium, equivalent to US$ 9.3 M.
Andy's personality was very complex, but the real thread was his fear of God and death. Even at the time of his greater social activity, the basics of his character were never freed from shyness. He could not become a preacher, but he wanted to spread his vision of the vanity of things in life. He was an artist. He was even the most important artist of his time.
His relationship with the Catholic religion remained intense without becoming conventional. Too shy to go to confession, he fled ceremonies but liked to attend in person, anonymously, the charity to the poor of New York. He was carrying parcels and served coffee and meals.
In 1986, he finds a true model for his life. This is Leonardo's Last Supper. Throughout that year, he reinterprets it in the Warholian fashion, creating about forty works including details, multiples and even camouflages.
He worked intensively on the model, up to challenge the original Leonardo, too much modified and damaged. Warhol's Last Supper is inspired by drawings of experts in search of the initial features of the work. Andy got the anxiety that the public and the critics do not understand how much his interpretation of Leonardo's Last Supper was a serious work although he had spent his life in a continuous mockery of modern civilization.
The exhibition of 20 Last Suppers in Milan on January 22, 1987 was a triumph. Sitting in front of a simple Formica table, Andy signed autographs. Sick and exhausted, he had to interrupt his stay. Warhol died of the consequences of his creative act, like Van Gogh, De Staël and Klein.
A multiple of a detail of the Last Supper, Christ 112 times yellow, 2 x 10.7 m, was sold for $ 9.5 million including premium by Sotheby's on May 14, 2008.
Varying the colors from a work to another according to his usual practice, the double Last Supper 102 x 102 cm is the most common version. One of them was sold for $ 6.8 million including premium by Sotheby's on November 9, 2010. Another double Supper in same size is estimated SEK 60M, for sale on May 14 by Bukowskis in Stockholm.
I urge you to read the catalog issued by Bukowskis, which includes a fascinating study on the relation of Andy Warhol with religion.
I invite you to play the video shared by the auction house.
POST SALE COMMENT
This interesting Warhol painting has not reached its estimate but it was sold : SEK 61M including premium, equivalent to US$ 9.3 M.
1986 Zao Wou-Ki inspired by Zhang Daqian
2018 SOLD for HK$ 44M including premium
An oil on canvas 195 x 130 cm titled and dated 25.06.86 by Zao Wou-Ki was sold for HK $ 25.3M including premium by Sotheby's on April 2, 2012. I had discussed it in this column before the sale. It is illustrated in the Artvalue database. This painting is estimated HK $ 34M for sale on April 2, 2018 by China Guardian in Hong Kong, lot 24.
This artwork is an accomplishment of the mutual influence of Zao Wou-Ki (Zhao Wuji) and Zhang Daqian.
Working then for thirty years in France, Zao is finally applauded in Asia in 1981 and 1982 with an exhibition tour of his art in Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore. Zhang Daqian, who then resides in Taiwan, is interested in Zao's abstract approach continuously borderline from a figurative evocation.
In 1982 Zhang painted his ultimate masterpiece, Peach Blossom Spring, which is both his lost paradise and his hope for spring renewal. This 209 x 92 cm hanging scroll was sold for HK $ 270M including premium by Sotheby's on April 5, 2016. In 1983 the two artists met in Taipei a few weeks before Zhang's death.
25.06.86 and Peach Blossom Spring have much in common : the vertical format, the composition in large zones of opposite densities, each one consisting of a mingle of delicate hues, and the sharp lines in the foreground over the lower edge. We can also compare the transparent layers of Zao's paint with Zhang's signature ink splashes. 25.06.86 is close to the display of a large waterfall veiling the lower rocks and falling onto a lake.
This artwork is an accomplishment of the mutual influence of Zao Wou-Ki (Zhao Wuji) and Zhang Daqian.
Working then for thirty years in France, Zao is finally applauded in Asia in 1981 and 1982 with an exhibition tour of his art in Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore. Zhang Daqian, who then resides in Taiwan, is interested in Zao's abstract approach continuously borderline from a figurative evocation.
In 1982 Zhang painted his ultimate masterpiece, Peach Blossom Spring, which is both his lost paradise and his hope for spring renewal. This 209 x 92 cm hanging scroll was sold for HK $ 270M including premium by Sotheby's on April 5, 2016. In 1983 the two artists met in Taipei a few weeks before Zhang's death.
25.06.86 and Peach Blossom Spring have much in common : the vertical format, the composition in large zones of opposite densities, each one consisting of a mingle of delicate hues, and the sharp lines in the foreground over the lower edge. We can also compare the transparent layers of Zao's paint with Zhang's signature ink splashes. 25.06.86 is close to the display of a large waterfall veiling the lower rocks and falling onto a lake.
1986 Raza within the Shades of Earth
2014 SOLD for US$ 1.36M including premium
SH Raza is a landscape painter whose colors intermingled up to abstraction in the early 1970s. La Terre (French title given by the artist) is one of the guidelines of his entire work.
In the 1980s, contrasts of light and topographic details have vanished. Lines that are often parallel form a sort of oblique floor as if the artist saw it fleeing from his feet in a false perspective.
The title is explicit and indeed significant: the painting displays the harmony of the warm undertones of the earth in burnt sienna, yellow ocher, red, brown and green. This unquestionable interpretation is also a hint to find the meaning of the mystical works of Raza, his other abstract line of the same period.
Raza shakes dimensions, removes limits, captures the viewer, communicates with the ground, in much subtle colors. His abstract art is one of the most expressive, in the following of Balla, Mondrian, Rothko, Pollock and Zao Wou-ki.
On June 10, 2010, Christie's sold for £ 2.4M including premium Saurashtra, an acrylic on canvas 2 x 2 m painted in 1983.
On 15 September 2010, the same auction house sold for $ 1.93M including premium an example of La Terre painted in same technique and size in 1985.
The acrylic on canvas La Terre for sale by Saffronart in New Delhi on September 4 has a similar inspiration. Painted in 1986, this picture is centered with a big black spot that opens a gaping path to the Hindu wisdom. This painting 162 x 178 cm is estimated Rs 5 crores, equivalent to US$ 830K, lot 15.
In the 1980s, contrasts of light and topographic details have vanished. Lines that are often parallel form a sort of oblique floor as if the artist saw it fleeing from his feet in a false perspective.
The title is explicit and indeed significant: the painting displays the harmony of the warm undertones of the earth in burnt sienna, yellow ocher, red, brown and green. This unquestionable interpretation is also a hint to find the meaning of the mystical works of Raza, his other abstract line of the same period.
Raza shakes dimensions, removes limits, captures the viewer, communicates with the ground, in much subtle colors. His abstract art is one of the most expressive, in the following of Balla, Mondrian, Rothko, Pollock and Zao Wou-ki.
On June 10, 2010, Christie's sold for £ 2.4M including premium Saurashtra, an acrylic on canvas 2 x 2 m painted in 1983.
On 15 September 2010, the same auction house sold for $ 1.93M including premium an example of La Terre painted in same technique and size in 1985.
The acrylic on canvas La Terre for sale by Saffronart in New Delhi on September 4 has a similar inspiration. Painted in 1986, this picture is centered with a big black spot that opens a gaping path to the Hindu wisdom. This painting 162 x 178 cm is estimated Rs 5 crores, equivalent to US$ 830K, lot 15.
1986 The Only True Friend of Francis Bacon
2020 WITHDRAWN
Francis Bacon enjoyed confrontations. Having become famous, he despised the deference of his interlocutors. In 1974 in Soho, he was invectived by the bartender John Edwards who criticized his selfishness. John was right. Francis returns to his studio and begins to paint his first portrait of John Edwards.
John was handicapped by a severe dyslexia which had ruined his education. He could barely read and write but his behavior was direct and sociable. Francis will say of John that he was the only true friend he ever had, and will designate him in his will as his sole heir. The age difference was 40 years.
Such a trust was new to the old artist. John became his photographer. This strong boy could also be his bodyguard. On happy days, he had the privilege of entering the workshop while Francis was working. He was the only witness to the lifelong drama of the artist who constantly seemed to be fighting with his canvas.
Francis painted more than twenty portraits of John. Their friendship changed his style. No more caricatured faces and deliquescent bodies. On the large triptych painted in 1984, John is gently seated on a stool and normally dressed. He is recognizable by his prominent jaw which the artist reinforced with a white line in the two side views. This opus was sold for $ 81M including premium by Christie's on May 13, 2014.
On July 28 in London, Sotheby's sells Study for Portrait of John Edwards, oil, pastel and spray on canvas 198 x 148 cm painted in 1986, lot 44 estimated £ 12M. The naked man is standing, leaning slightly to the left in a quiet attitude. The body is not denatured except for the shoulders which are too wide. The jaw is underlined in white. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
John was handicapped by a severe dyslexia which had ruined his education. He could barely read and write but his behavior was direct and sociable. Francis will say of John that he was the only true friend he ever had, and will designate him in his will as his sole heir. The age difference was 40 years.
Such a trust was new to the old artist. John became his photographer. This strong boy could also be his bodyguard. On happy days, he had the privilege of entering the workshop while Francis was working. He was the only witness to the lifelong drama of the artist who constantly seemed to be fighting with his canvas.
Francis painted more than twenty portraits of John. Their friendship changed his style. No more caricatured faces and deliquescent bodies. On the large triptych painted in 1984, John is gently seated on a stool and normally dressed. He is recognizable by his prominent jaw which the artist reinforced with a white line in the two side views. This opus was sold for $ 81M including premium by Christie's on May 13, 2014.
On July 28 in London, Sotheby's sells Study for Portrait of John Edwards, oil, pastel and spray on canvas 198 x 148 cm painted in 1986, lot 44 estimated £ 12M. The naked man is standing, leaning slightly to the left in a quiet attitude. The body is not denatured except for the shoulders which are too wide. The jaw is underlined in white. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
1986 The Useless Machines of Tinguely
2009 unsold
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Tinguely's machines are heavy and ugly but they have something amazing, which was intended by the artist. Once the engine is started, the object automatically takes positions that go beyond their original design. His art is thus close to the gestural painting of Pollock (or of Boronali !), to the pasty achromes of Manzoni, to Calder mobiles and to the physico-chemical experiments of his friend Yves Klein.
Tinguely is also a pioneer of happenings, with his self-destructive machines, and of installations, including a complex example estimated 800 K € by Pierre Bergé et Associés in Brussels on December 6. Eight motorized structures with anthropomorphic look consist of a variety of scrap metals overcome by skulls and jaws of animals. The tallest is 2 meters high. Their movements are not synchronous, of course.
The artist had humor. In French, they are witches. In German, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It is a way of inviting the viewer to see what he wants. The chain that separates the machines from the public was prepared by Tinguely and is part of the artwork. This installation exhibited for the first time in 1986 had required one year of preparation.
Tinguely's machines are heavy and ugly but they have something amazing, which was intended by the artist. Once the engine is started, the object automatically takes positions that go beyond their original design. His art is thus close to the gestural painting of Pollock (or of Boronali !), to the pasty achromes of Manzoni, to Calder mobiles and to the physico-chemical experiments of his friend Yves Klein.
Tinguely is also a pioneer of happenings, with his self-destructive machines, and of installations, including a complex example estimated 800 K € by Pierre Bergé et Associés in Brussels on December 6. Eight motorized structures with anthropomorphic look consist of a variety of scrap metals overcome by skulls and jaws of animals. The tallest is 2 meters high. Their movements are not synchronous, of course.
The artist had humor. In French, they are witches. In German, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It is a way of inviting the viewer to see what he wants. The chain that separates the machines from the public was prepared by Tinguely and is part of the artwork. This installation exhibited for the first time in 1986 had required one year of preparation.
1986 A LARGE ABSTRACT PAINTING BY GERHARD RICHTER
2008 UNSOLD
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
On October 19, Christie's holds in London its sale of postwar and contemporary art, and of course works of high quality are announced.
The size of the artwork and the reputation of the artist are fundamental values of contemporary art. We shall therefore particularly note a monumental abstract painting by Gerhard Richter, 311 x 406 cm, entitled Claudius, and assumed to represent the forces of chaos. Painted in large strokes of brilliant colors (red, yellow, white) on a dark background, this oil on linen is dating from 1986.
Richter's work is remarkably varied: it ranges from abstract to contemporary figurative subjects, and very high prices are regularly recorded in all categories. In New York, two abstract paintings have already been around $ 15 million, one at Christie's on May 13 (250 x 400 cm, 1987), the other at Sotheby's the following day (200 x 180 cm, 1990).
For the painting coming on October 19, Christie's announced that the price could be in the range of £ 6 million.
On October 19, Christie's holds in London its sale of postwar and contemporary art, and of course works of high quality are announced.
The size of the artwork and the reputation of the artist are fundamental values of contemporary art. We shall therefore particularly note a monumental abstract painting by Gerhard Richter, 311 x 406 cm, entitled Claudius, and assumed to represent the forces of chaos. Painted in large strokes of brilliant colors (red, yellow, white) on a dark background, this oil on linen is dating from 1986.
Richter's work is remarkably varied: it ranges from abstract to contemporary figurative subjects, and very high prices are regularly recorded in all categories. In New York, two abstract paintings have already been around $ 15 million, one at Christie's on May 13 (250 x 400 cm, 1987), the other at Sotheby's the following day (200 x 180 cm, 1990).
For the painting coming on October 19, Christie's announced that the price could be in the range of £ 6 million.
1987 Apfelbäume by Richter
2022 SOLD for $ 9.8M by Christie's
In the 1960s Gerhard Richter painted in black and white from blurred press clipping. Two decades later his continuous quest for the deep meaning of art had come to a priority to the abstract disposition on the canvas of a wide range of colors.
Richter is an experimenter. In the 1980s, while going increasingly abstract, he tries again his hand to the blur, but now in color. He had not tried to paint a non-significant meadow landscape between the Haus Sohl of 1972 and the Wiese of 1983, followed by a few examples in 1984 and 1985.
In 1987 this theme is growing with about 20 paintings in his catalogue raisonné. In his own wording, he wanted to demonstrate how much a painted landscape is "untruthful" or "inhuman" despite a mirage of familiarity, because Nature itself is "mindless". He arguably was not so convinced and hardly reused the somehow boring theme afterwards.
The opus 650-2 is titled Apfelbäume. This oil on canvas 72 x 102 cm painted in 1987 was sold for $ 9.8M from a lower estimate of $ 5M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 31.
Richter is an experimenter. In the 1980s, while going increasingly abstract, he tries again his hand to the blur, but now in color. He had not tried to paint a non-significant meadow landscape between the Haus Sohl of 1972 and the Wiese of 1983, followed by a few examples in 1984 and 1985.
In 1987 this theme is growing with about 20 paintings in his catalogue raisonné. In his own wording, he wanted to demonstrate how much a painted landscape is "untruthful" or "inhuman" despite a mirage of familiarity, because Nature itself is "mindless". He arguably was not so convinced and hardly reused the somehow boring theme afterwards.
The opus 650-2 is titled Apfelbäume. This oil on canvas 72 x 102 cm painted in 1987 was sold for $ 9.8M from a lower estimate of $ 5M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 31.
1987 Victor 25448 by Basquiat
2020 SOLD for $ 9.3M by Phillips
Warhol's success was a model for Basquiat. Andy agrees to help his younger colleague and they create four-handed paintings in 1984 and 1985. The failure of an exhibition of these works permanently separates the two artists.
Basquiat is in poor health. The effects of drug are already visible in 1985 through dark spots on his face. His notoriety is an aggravating factor. The former street artist does not know what to do with his money. Like Rothko at the height of his fame, he observes that his admirers are no more decoding his messages. By reaction Jim Crow, painted in 1986, is an unambiguous protest against slavery.
Warhol's sudden death in February 1987 had a catastrophic effect on Basquiat. The young man now understands that the expression of his social revolt through his art will never serve any purpose.
In 1981 his themes had been dynamic and excessive with a nice tangle of bright colors. In 1986 he replaces the street art of the teenagers by a road art of hobos, for which he was inspired by a semiotics manual, the Symbol Sourcebook by Henry Dreyfuss. The hobos (homeless boys) are the itinerant daily workers, who communicate with each other by drawing symbols on the walls for identifying the dangers.
Victor 25448, acrylic, oilstick, wax and pencil on paper laid on canvas 183 x 333 cm, was sold for $ 9.3M by Phillips on July 2, 2020, lot 10.
This desperate work was made in 1987. The character is disfigured, blinded, drawn and quartered, in a hopeless world inscribed in three places with the IDEAL tag on advertising objects that symbolize the capitalist oppression.
In the lower left corner, Basquiat grouped together several of the hobo symbols collected by Dreyfuss, with their meanings. They include the very discouraging "Nothing to be gained here", which Basquiat also used in the same year in Riddle Me This Batman, and "A beating awaits you here".
Basquiat could not do without music and he owned 3,000 records. 25448 is the reference in the catalog of the music editor Victor for a 1936 song by Al Bowlly.
Basquiat is in poor health. The effects of drug are already visible in 1985 through dark spots on his face. His notoriety is an aggravating factor. The former street artist does not know what to do with his money. Like Rothko at the height of his fame, he observes that his admirers are no more decoding his messages. By reaction Jim Crow, painted in 1986, is an unambiguous protest against slavery.
Warhol's sudden death in February 1987 had a catastrophic effect on Basquiat. The young man now understands that the expression of his social revolt through his art will never serve any purpose.
In 1981 his themes had been dynamic and excessive with a nice tangle of bright colors. In 1986 he replaces the street art of the teenagers by a road art of hobos, for which he was inspired by a semiotics manual, the Symbol Sourcebook by Henry Dreyfuss. The hobos (homeless boys) are the itinerant daily workers, who communicate with each other by drawing symbols on the walls for identifying the dangers.
Victor 25448, acrylic, oilstick, wax and pencil on paper laid on canvas 183 x 333 cm, was sold for $ 9.3M by Phillips on July 2, 2020, lot 10.
This desperate work was made in 1987. The character is disfigured, blinded, drawn and quartered, in a hopeless world inscribed in three places with the IDEAL tag on advertising objects that symbolize the capitalist oppression.
In the lower left corner, Basquiat grouped together several of the hobo symbols collected by Dreyfuss, with their meanings. They include the very discouraging "Nothing to be gained here", which Basquiat also used in the same year in Riddle Me This Batman, and "A beating awaits you here".
Basquiat could not do without music and he owned 3,000 records. 25448 is the reference in the catalog of the music editor Victor for a 1936 song by Al Bowlly.
1987 Pod and Stick
2013 SOLD 7.7 M$ including premium
Cy Twombly was one of the most disturbing artists of the last century. Signs that spread across his paintings belong to no language but invite reflection on the origin and mechanism of written communication. In graphology, the positioning of "text" and the graphic details are more important than the word.
The exegesis of Twombly requires a detailed study taking into account the evolution of his scribbles. It shall find a logical place to a surprising bronze made in Rome in 1987, for sale by Christie's in New York on May 15.
A stick is plugged into the ground. A poppy stem planted just below it joins the stick by a knot at two thirds of height, culminating in the pod at 1.93 m high. Here is the link to the catalog.
The fate of plant and stick are inseparable, but their languages are opposed. The stick is straight and the plant is flexible. The object is strong, but the vegetable is weak with its seed that curves the top of the stem. The link between these two elements is a help and not a fight, but what can it serve to help a simple poppy to build its flower?
Twombly's sculptures, made for his own pleasure, are extremely rare on the art market, especially in this dimension. This bronze is estimated $ 6M.
POST SALE COMMENT
This very curious tribute to the poppy was certainly the most unusual artwork in May 2013 New York sales. It got a good price, $ 7.7 million including premium.
The exegesis of Twombly requires a detailed study taking into account the evolution of his scribbles. It shall find a logical place to a surprising bronze made in Rome in 1987, for sale by Christie's in New York on May 15.
A stick is plugged into the ground. A poppy stem planted just below it joins the stick by a knot at two thirds of height, culminating in the pod at 1.93 m high. Here is the link to the catalog.
The fate of plant and stick are inseparable, but their languages are opposed. The stick is straight and the plant is flexible. The object is strong, but the vegetable is weak with its seed that curves the top of the stem. The link between these two elements is a help and not a fight, but what can it serve to help a simple poppy to build its flower?
Twombly's sculptures, made for his own pleasure, are extremely rare on the art market, especially in this dimension. This bronze is estimated $ 6M.
POST SALE COMMENT
This very curious tribute to the poppy was certainly the most unusual artwork in May 2013 New York sales. It got a good price, $ 7.7 million including premium.
1987 Post Soviet Installations by Ilya Kabakov
2011 SOLD 1.5 M£ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Artist and illustrator, Ilya Kabakov was a member of the Union of Soviet Artists. Far from being a dissident, he was nonetheless aware of the difficulties of the Soviet social model.
Increasingly influenced by contemporary art, he specialized in installations from 1983, and emigrated in 1987, during the perestroika.
Entitled 'Holidays', an installation created in Paris in 1987 is reminiscent of the life in the Soviet Union. In twelve largepaintings, it shows ordinary people during their holidays.
Yet, everything is blurred. Each painting is filled with regular bits of paper foils, arrange to obstruct the view of the spectator and the memory of the illusory happiness of the past. The floor of the showroom is littered with trash, oldnewspapers and overturned chairs.
Holidays No. 10, 100 x 156 cm, is estimated £ 1.5 million, for sale in London by Phillips de Pury on April 14. The catalog page is shared by the auction platform LiveAuctioneers. The main picture shows a picnic scene, truncated at the bottom right with a smaller picture where tourists take their bath.
It is interesting to note such an attraction of the banality of the album of family photos to an artist seeking to position in front of the issues of communism. In China, Zhang Xiaogang will follow a similar intellectual process.
Artist and illustrator, Ilya Kabakov was a member of the Union of Soviet Artists. Far from being a dissident, he was nonetheless aware of the difficulties of the Soviet social model.
Increasingly influenced by contemporary art, he specialized in installations from 1983, and emigrated in 1987, during the perestroika.
Entitled 'Holidays', an installation created in Paris in 1987 is reminiscent of the life in the Soviet Union. In twelve largepaintings, it shows ordinary people during their holidays.
Yet, everything is blurred. Each painting is filled with regular bits of paper foils, arrange to obstruct the view of the spectator and the memory of the illusory happiness of the past. The floor of the showroom is littered with trash, oldnewspapers and overturned chairs.
Holidays No. 10, 100 x 156 cm, is estimated £ 1.5 million, for sale in London by Phillips de Pury on April 14. The catalog page is shared by the auction platform LiveAuctioneers. The main picture shows a picnic scene, truncated at the bottom right with a smaller picture where tourists take their bath.
It is interesting to note such an attraction of the banality of the album of family photos to an artist seeking to position in front of the issues of communism. In China, Zhang Xiaogang will follow a similar intellectual process.
1987 The Metaphysics of Erol Akyavas
2012 SOLD for TL 2.7M including premium (worth US$ 1.5M at that time)
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
On March 7, 2010 in Istanbul, Antik AS sold TL 2.65 M including premium a monumental painting by Erol Akyavas.Entitled The Siege, 266 x 385 cm, this oil on canvas dated 1982 showed a clash between cosmic powers. The imagewas divided into remarkably aggressive color zones.
Five years later, in 1987, Erol Akyavas realizes En-el Hak (I am the Truth), a canvas sizing 190 x 350 cm which is undoubtedly one of his masterpieces.
The dehumanized space is divided into four colors separated by irregular lines like horizonts or clouds, dispositionedin a radiant segment whose center is moved to infinity on the right. Justifying the title, a broken lightning is hoveringover this universe like a metaphysical calligraphy.
This immense work is estimated TL 1.2 million, for sale by Antik AS in Istanbul on March 25. The sale is managed by the specialized auctioneer Olgac Artam.
POST SALE COMMENT
New success for Akyavas at Antik AS : TL 2.2M before fees, 2.7M including premium.
On March 7, 2010 in Istanbul, Antik AS sold TL 2.65 M including premium a monumental painting by Erol Akyavas.Entitled The Siege, 266 x 385 cm, this oil on canvas dated 1982 showed a clash between cosmic powers. The imagewas divided into remarkably aggressive color zones.
Five years later, in 1987, Erol Akyavas realizes En-el Hak (I am the Truth), a canvas sizing 190 x 350 cm which is undoubtedly one of his masterpieces.
The dehumanized space is divided into four colors separated by irregular lines like horizonts or clouds, dispositionedin a radiant segment whose center is moved to infinity on the right. Justifying the title, a broken lightning is hoveringover this universe like a metaphysical calligraphy.
This immense work is estimated TL 1.2 million, for sale by Antik AS in Istanbul on March 25. The sale is managed by the specialized auctioneer Olgac Artam.
POST SALE COMMENT
New success for Akyavas at Antik AS : TL 2.2M before fees, 2.7M including premium.
1987 The Wall Mounted Modules of Donald Judd
2010 sold 735 K£ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
The history of art has lived a succession of all the trends, based on design, symbol, texture. Donald Judd was limited to volumes. He was the artist of wall mounted parallelepipeds.
The material is unglorious: aluminum. Finishing alternates between raw metal and metal painted in black, white or in bright industrial colors.
His structures are not made to be useful. They are not the shelves of Perriand. It is art. The terrible regularity of the works of Judd would almost pass Mondrian for a comic. He rather found his inspiration in the teaching of Itten.
Thus, the work of 1987 to sell by Phillips de Pury in London on February 12 is
composed of two horizontal elements, to hang one above the other, each measuring 30 x 360 x 30 cm. Each of these elements includes two rows consist of alternating small and large juxtaposed boxes.
The estimate, £ 600 K, is reasonable. This is not its first attempt at auction: two years ago, it was thought that it was worth more.
POST SALE COMMENT
Good result, just above the low estimate: 620 K£ before fees, 735 K£ including premium.
Here is the online catalog with pictures of the artwork, shared by LiveAuctioneers.
The history of art has lived a succession of all the trends, based on design, symbol, texture. Donald Judd was limited to volumes. He was the artist of wall mounted parallelepipeds.
The material is unglorious: aluminum. Finishing alternates between raw metal and metal painted in black, white or in bright industrial colors.
His structures are not made to be useful. They are not the shelves of Perriand. It is art. The terrible regularity of the works of Judd would almost pass Mondrian for a comic. He rather found his inspiration in the teaching of Itten.
Thus, the work of 1987 to sell by Phillips de Pury in London on February 12 is
composed of two horizontal elements, to hang one above the other, each measuring 30 x 360 x 30 cm. Each of these elements includes two rows consist of alternating small and large juxtaposed boxes.
The estimate, £ 600 K, is reasonable. This is not its first attempt at auction: two years ago, it was thought that it was worth more.
POST SALE COMMENT
Good result, just above the low estimate: 620 K£ before fees, 735 K£ including premium.
Here is the online catalog with pictures of the artwork, shared by LiveAuctioneers.
1987 AN ICONIC WORK BY FISCHLI AND WEISS
2008 SOLD 1 MCHF INCLUDING PREMIUM
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
I usually look in priority in the press releases at what I did not know. So I could not let you ignore that Christie's will sell on December 1 in Zurich a work they describe as an "icon of Swiss contemporary art" in two releases which are exclusively dedicated to it, one in English and the other in German.
This is an installation of 1987 entitled Der Lauf der Dinge (The Way things go) by the Swiss artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss. Two low showcases, of 145 x 145 x 57 cm each, contain ordinary objects including two tires, bottles containing flammable products, and many other small things.
This work proceeds from both the ready made and the happening. Indeed, its achievement was the subject of a film that was presented with the artwork at Documenta 8 in Kassel in 1987. If you believe what the press release is saying, the success of the video that was produced from the film was considerable and international. Visitors detected an anthromorphised character in the forty objects presented in the video, starring with a bottle mounted on a roller skate.
Christie's is usually more cautious than its main competitor in its releases and in its estimates. So let us look forward to the estimate of the lot: 900 KCHF. This price includes the original 16 mm reel!
We have in mind, of course, the pharmaceutical and physiological showcases of Damien Hirst.
POST SALE COMMENT
The Swiss may be happy with the result. This work has found a new owner for 1 MCHF costs included.
I usually look in priority in the press releases at what I did not know. So I could not let you ignore that Christie's will sell on December 1 in Zurich a work they describe as an "icon of Swiss contemporary art" in two releases which are exclusively dedicated to it, one in English and the other in German.
This is an installation of 1987 entitled Der Lauf der Dinge (The Way things go) by the Swiss artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss. Two low showcases, of 145 x 145 x 57 cm each, contain ordinary objects including two tires, bottles containing flammable products, and many other small things.
This work proceeds from both the ready made and the happening. Indeed, its achievement was the subject of a film that was presented with the artwork at Documenta 8 in Kassel in 1987. If you believe what the press release is saying, the success of the video that was produced from the film was considerable and international. Visitors detected an anthromorphised character in the forty objects presented in the video, starring with a bottle mounted on a roller skate.
Christie's is usually more cautious than its main competitor in its releases and in its estimates. So let us look forward to the estimate of the lot: 900 KCHF. This price includes the original 16 mm reel!
We have in mind, of course, the pharmaceutical and physiological showcases of Damien Hirst.
POST SALE COMMENT
The Swiss may be happy with the result. This work has found a new owner for 1 MCHF costs included.
1987 John Biggers highlighted by Swann
2009 sold 216 K$ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Swann Auction Galleries in New York created in 2007 a department specializing in modern and current African American art. They organize on October 8 their sixth sale on this theme. For us, this specialty is very interesting because it opens the way for the discovery of still ignored artists.
John Biggers was a painter, illustrator and muralist, influenced by contemporary Africa. He shows the anguish of people who feel threatened because of their race and their beliefs.
This is indeed not happy, but the rather late painting, 1987, for sale by Swann goes even further. This acrylic and oil on canvas, 107 x 127 cm, pushes the theme to despair, with a mockery that is rare in what I could see elsewhere from his art.
It is titled Shotguns. We see a cemetery consisting of standing shotgun houses. Each of the five of them on front row is inhabited by a black woman. Their attitude is quiet, but they have their hands crossed on a miniature representation of the shotgun house confirming that they are the actual target of the shot.
Nothing similar from this artist had been auctioned before. This painting is estimated 200 K$.
POST SALE COMMENT
I said that I had not seen anything like it. This lot will therefore refer to this style of social criticism in the work of Biggers. The price remained below the low estimate: 180 K$ hammer, 216 K$ including premium.
The image is in the top left of the page shared by Art Market Monitor.
Swann Auction Galleries in New York created in 2007 a department specializing in modern and current African American art. They organize on October 8 their sixth sale on this theme. For us, this specialty is very interesting because it opens the way for the discovery of still ignored artists.
John Biggers was a painter, illustrator and muralist, influenced by contemporary Africa. He shows the anguish of people who feel threatened because of their race and their beliefs.
This is indeed not happy, but the rather late painting, 1987, for sale by Swann goes even further. This acrylic and oil on canvas, 107 x 127 cm, pushes the theme to despair, with a mockery that is rare in what I could see elsewhere from his art.
It is titled Shotguns. We see a cemetery consisting of standing shotgun houses. Each of the five of them on front row is inhabited by a black woman. Their attitude is quiet, but they have their hands crossed on a miniature representation of the shotgun house confirming that they are the actual target of the shot.
Nothing similar from this artist had been auctioned before. This painting is estimated 200 K$.
POST SALE COMMENT
I said that I had not seen anything like it. This lot will therefore refer to this style of social criticism in the work of Biggers. The price remained below the low estimate: 180 K$ hammer, 216 K$ including premium.
The image is in the top left of the page shared by Art Market Monitor.
1987 From Yalta to the United Nations
2018 unsold
In 1945 the Yalta Conference is a great diplomatic victory for Stalin. The USSR will be able to extend its domination over the whole Eastern Europe. A few months later the United Nations is created.
In 1982 Komar and Melamid live for a few years in New York as a duet of artists who sign together their mixed media artworks. Their message of political mockery had finally made their activity unsustainable in Soviet Russia.
In the following of Surrealism and Dadaism, Vitaly Komar mixes the periods by confronting the idols of the Soviet regime with earlier figures like Karl Marx or George Washington. The mixed memory of the chromos in his child's bedroom makes him imagining Stalin's mustache on the lips of Mona Lisa.
During Komar's childhood the image of the Father of Peoples was omnipresent. Yet it was in New York that he first saw Yalta's famous official photo confronting the symbolic leading characters of tyranny, democracy and monarchy.
In 1982 Komar and Melamid execute Yalta Conference, tempera and oil on canvas 102 x 76 cm, unsold at Macdougall's on 7 June 2017 from a lower estimate of £ 80K.
Stalin sits on the right in the style of Soviet realism. On the left Roosevelt gets the head of Spielberg's E.T., far away from the realities of our world. He is fully recognizable by his attitude and the position of his hands, copied from the Yalta photo. Churchill is absent : in 1982 Great Britain plays no role in the confrontation of the blocks. Behind them a sly Hitler makes the gesture of silence : the risk of a come back of absolutism is never removed.
On January 27 in Willoughby OH, Milestone Auctions sells a larger copy 183 x 127 cm which was first exhibited in 1987 at Documenta 8 in Kassel. It is estimated $ 800K with a starting bid at $ 200K, lot 327C. It is dated 1982 by the artists, probably by reference to the date of the original version.
This later version, whose history of recent exhibitions is important, is the symbol of the Nostalgic Socialist Realism. Its theme was not accepted in a contest for a wall painting in the United Nations building on the pretext that Stalin's figure is still offensive to some nations.
In 1982 Komar and Melamid live for a few years in New York as a duet of artists who sign together their mixed media artworks. Their message of political mockery had finally made their activity unsustainable in Soviet Russia.
In the following of Surrealism and Dadaism, Vitaly Komar mixes the periods by confronting the idols of the Soviet regime with earlier figures like Karl Marx or George Washington. The mixed memory of the chromos in his child's bedroom makes him imagining Stalin's mustache on the lips of Mona Lisa.
During Komar's childhood the image of the Father of Peoples was omnipresent. Yet it was in New York that he first saw Yalta's famous official photo confronting the symbolic leading characters of tyranny, democracy and monarchy.
In 1982 Komar and Melamid execute Yalta Conference, tempera and oil on canvas 102 x 76 cm, unsold at Macdougall's on 7 June 2017 from a lower estimate of £ 80K.
Stalin sits on the right in the style of Soviet realism. On the left Roosevelt gets the head of Spielberg's E.T., far away from the realities of our world. He is fully recognizable by his attitude and the position of his hands, copied from the Yalta photo. Churchill is absent : in 1982 Great Britain plays no role in the confrontation of the blocks. Behind them a sly Hitler makes the gesture of silence : the risk of a come back of absolutism is never removed.
On January 27 in Willoughby OH, Milestone Auctions sells a larger copy 183 x 127 cm which was first exhibited in 1987 at Documenta 8 in Kassel. It is estimated $ 800K with a starting bid at $ 200K, lot 327C. It is dated 1982 by the artists, probably by reference to the date of the original version.
This later version, whose history of recent exhibitions is important, is the symbol of the Nostalgic Socialist Realism. Its theme was not accepted in a contest for a wall painting in the United Nations building on the pretext that Stalin's figure is still offensive to some nations.
1987 the ultimate brawls of jean-michel basquiat
2016 withdrawn
Jean-Michel Basquiat is discouraged and drug addicted. The end is for soon. Andy Warhol, with whom he enjoyed working, dies in February 1987.
Jean-Michel works little, but still expresses the same aggressiveness against white domination and capitalism. Tags on the squalid walls bear his scream, with unsequenced letters and meaningless words among which the real messages must be sought.
On February 10 in London, Sotheby's sells an acrylic, oilstick and xerox collage on canvas 213 x 152 cm realized in 1987, lot 41 estimated £ 6M.
The character in skeleton structure is wearing a top hat with which he claims for a funeral voodoo rite. The fist is raised in the gesture of the Black power. Behind him, the main message appears twice: Despues de un Puno without tilde because the walls are not required to respect the spelling.
The copyright sign placed everywhere and the letters ESSO angrily blocked express that the ultimate fight of this autobiographical skeleton was against capitalism. One of the two marks Despues de un Puno is also crossed out, indicating the uncertainty of this Pyrrhic victory after which the character exhibits a paltry triumphalism.
Jean-Michel probably feels that he has already lost his fight to identify and maintain his place in society. His art will always remain helpless against the political and economic powers. He dies on August 12, 1988, aged 27. Yet he had been the most gifted artist of his generation.
Jean-Michel works little, but still expresses the same aggressiveness against white domination and capitalism. Tags on the squalid walls bear his scream, with unsequenced letters and meaningless words among which the real messages must be sought.
On February 10 in London, Sotheby's sells an acrylic, oilstick and xerox collage on canvas 213 x 152 cm realized in 1987, lot 41 estimated £ 6M.
The character in skeleton structure is wearing a top hat with which he claims for a funeral voodoo rite. The fist is raised in the gesture of the Black power. Behind him, the main message appears twice: Despues de un Puno without tilde because the walls are not required to respect the spelling.
The copyright sign placed everywhere and the letters ESSO angrily blocked express that the ultimate fight of this autobiographical skeleton was against capitalism. One of the two marks Despues de un Puno is also crossed out, indicating the uncertainty of this Pyrrhic victory after which the character exhibits a paltry triumphalism.
Jean-Michel probably feels that he has already lost his fight to identify and maintain his place in society. His art will always remain helpless against the political and economic powers. He dies on August 12, 1988, aged 27. Yet he had been the most gifted artist of his generation.
1987-1988 Ocean by Vija Celmins
2021 SOLD for $ 7.7M by Phillips.
Vija Celmins begins her artistic career in Los Angeles in the wake of pop art by painting images of ordinary objects and reproductions of black and white photographs. Influenced also by the art in shades of grey by Morandi, she specialized in graphite drawing from 1965, starting with hyperrealist enlargements of photographs of clouds shot by herself.
In 1968 she modified her technique by drawing on a paper previously covered with an acrylic paint. Through more than ten years she photographed and painstakingly copied the swell of the Pacific Ocean from the end of the pier at Venice Beach in LA.
The total absence of land and life brings an illusion of infinity which can be compared with the paintings by Agnes Martin. The respective distance of the undulations of the sea brings the perspective that is lacking in the art of Martin. These patterns of line may also be compared with the op art of Bridget Riley.
She went back to oil painting in an intention to give more "weight", in her own wording, to her works in that theme. An Untitled oil on canvas 36 x 42 cm painted in 1987-1988 was sold for $ 7.7M from a lower estimate of $ 5.5M by Phillips on June 23, 2021, lot 14. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
In 1968 she modified her technique by drawing on a paper previously covered with an acrylic paint. Through more than ten years she photographed and painstakingly copied the swell of the Pacific Ocean from the end of the pier at Venice Beach in LA.
The total absence of land and life brings an illusion of infinity which can be compared with the paintings by Agnes Martin. The respective distance of the undulations of the sea brings the perspective that is lacking in the art of Martin. These patterns of line may also be compared with the op art of Bridget Riley.
She went back to oil painting in an intention to give more "weight", in her own wording, to her works in that theme. An Untitled oil on canvas 36 x 42 cm painted in 1987-1988 was sold for $ 7.7M from a lower estimate of $ 5.5M by Phillips on June 23, 2021, lot 14. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
1988 The Promising Appearance of Zhang Xiaogang
2011 SOLD 79 MHK$ including premium
China has undergone great changes during the fifteen years that followed the death of Mao Zedong: political, demographic, economic, cultural.
In 1982, the population reached one billion people. Hua Guofeng implements the policy of one child, this confusing reform intended to control growth. The market economy promoted by Deng Xiaoping brought hope of expression freedom, and a new generation of artists appeared.
Among them, Zhang Xiaogang questioned China and the world. In 1988, he is 30 years old. His paintings Forever Lasting Love show humans, naked or half naked, front side, ostensibly facing toward the viewer. Of varied races, these characters symbolize an earthly paradise that irresistibly evokes Gauguin, and that appeals to a golden time from before the reforms.
On April 3 in Hong Kong, Sotheby's sells a triptych of unequal individual sizes (129 x 99, 123 x 97, 125 x 97 cm), estimated HK $ 25M. An oil on canvas, 129 x 99 cm, sold HK $ 12.6 million including premium by Christie's on May 27, 2007 appears to be strictly identical to the left side of the triptych.
After 1988, Zhang deliberately turns to his country. In 1992, his series Chapter of a New Century - Birth of the People's Republic of China shows a bright yellow naked baby beside an open book in front of a wall covered with family photos. One of these works was sold HK $ 52M including premium by Sotheby's on October 4, 2010.
The Bloodline series (Big Family or Comrades) for which the artist is best known now is the logical continuation of this approach. The reference to family pictures is a pretext to show groups of individuals undifferentiated in the vastness of the population.
I recommend reading the article by ARTINFO, where the triptych is shown, and which analyzes the reasons why this work from the Ullens collection is now on the market.
POST SALE COMMENT
Let's start by reading the catalog, which was not available when I prepared my article.
Each element of the triptych is announced at 125 x 98 cm. The left side made much more than "looking like" the lot sold at Christie's in 2007: indeed it is the same piece! The three elements have been united again thanks to that sale!
This triptych has an iconic value, reflecting the beginnings of a young Chinese artist who is one the most valued on the market. It was sold HK $ 79 million including premium.
In 1982, the population reached one billion people. Hua Guofeng implements the policy of one child, this confusing reform intended to control growth. The market economy promoted by Deng Xiaoping brought hope of expression freedom, and a new generation of artists appeared.
Among them, Zhang Xiaogang questioned China and the world. In 1988, he is 30 years old. His paintings Forever Lasting Love show humans, naked or half naked, front side, ostensibly facing toward the viewer. Of varied races, these characters symbolize an earthly paradise that irresistibly evokes Gauguin, and that appeals to a golden time from before the reforms.
On April 3 in Hong Kong, Sotheby's sells a triptych of unequal individual sizes (129 x 99, 123 x 97, 125 x 97 cm), estimated HK $ 25M. An oil on canvas, 129 x 99 cm, sold HK $ 12.6 million including premium by Christie's on May 27, 2007 appears to be strictly identical to the left side of the triptych.
After 1988, Zhang deliberately turns to his country. In 1992, his series Chapter of a New Century - Birth of the People's Republic of China shows a bright yellow naked baby beside an open book in front of a wall covered with family photos. One of these works was sold HK $ 52M including premium by Sotheby's on October 4, 2010.
The Bloodline series (Big Family or Comrades) for which the artist is best known now is the logical continuation of this approach. The reference to family pictures is a pretext to show groups of individuals undifferentiated in the vastness of the population.
I recommend reading the article by ARTINFO, where the triptych is shown, and which analyzes the reasons why this work from the Ullens collection is now on the market.
POST SALE COMMENT
Let's start by reading the catalog, which was not available when I prepared my article.
Each element of the triptych is announced at 125 x 98 cm. The left side made much more than "looking like" the lot sold at Christie's in 2007: indeed it is the same piece! The three elements have been united again thanks to that sale!
This triptych has an iconic value, reflecting the beginnings of a young Chinese artist who is one the most valued on the market. It was sold HK $ 79 million including premium.
1988 Self Portrait of Kippenberger as Silenus
2009 SOLD 4.1 M$ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Martin Kippenberger is the discovery of this year regarding the summit of the art market. In February, I discussed in this group the "Portrait of Paul Schreber", sold 430 K £ including fees at Phillips de Pury.
And now the surprise of the catalog of Sotheby's in New York for May 12: A self-portrait of 2.40 x 2 m, estimated $ 3.5 million.
At auction, no work of Kippenberger has ever attained this price, but no similar work has yet been proposed. In 1988, aged 35, he looks more than 50. He is wearing a loose underwear white pants, which makes the transition between his big belly full of beer and his trembling legs. Leaning forward, with his dark and bearded face, he may be about to vomit.
The artist expresses the disgust of his own body, much more direct than in the portrait of Schreber, a work that was too intellectual. If the pain of living is a characteristic of contemporary art, Martin Kippenberger was a champion.
Martin Kippenberger is the discovery of this year regarding the summit of the art market. In February, I discussed in this group the "Portrait of Paul Schreber", sold 430 K £ including fees at Phillips de Pury.
And now the surprise of the catalog of Sotheby's in New York for May 12: A self-portrait of 2.40 x 2 m, estimated $ 3.5 million.
At auction, no work of Kippenberger has ever attained this price, but no similar work has yet been proposed. In 1988, aged 35, he looks more than 50. He is wearing a loose underwear white pants, which makes the transition between his big belly full of beer and his trembling legs. Leaning forward, with his dark and bearded face, he may be about to vomit.
The artist expresses the disgust of his own body, much more direct than in the portrait of Schreber, a work that was too intellectual. If the pain of living is a characteristic of contemporary art, Martin Kippenberger was a champion.
1988 One Flew over Los Angeles
2019 SOLD for HK$ 31.4M including premium
In 1961, after a short experience in an advertising agency, Ed Ruscha visited Europe. Above the shops, the signs are composed in various appealing typographies. For the young artist who does not understand French, the beauty of these words is more important than their meaning.
From then on, Ruscha tirelessly positions words on more or less figurative images. This heterogeneous association has no meaning but it fascinates the viewer, as the assemblies of huge words by Christopher Wool will later do. Ruscha uses either single words that serve as slogans, or short sentences that include a contradiction, or movie titles.
Ruscha is living in Los Angeles since the late 1950s. From 1986 his City Lights series display an oblique perspective from an elevated viewpoint. The background of the image is a very dark night blue interrupted by the irregular lights of the perpendicular pattern of streets and their intersections. The letters are in very dark red on some opus and white on others. The title of the series is a reference to Chaplin.
I Tried to forget to remember, oil and acrylic on canvas 183 x 244 cm painted in 1986, was sold for $ 8.2M including premium by Sotheby's on May 16, 2019 over a lower estimate of $ 5M. The title paraphrases the "I Forgot to Remember to Forget" sung by Elvis Presley. The letters are red.
The series continues in 1987. Whiz kids, 168 x 168 cm, was sold for $ 4.2M including premium by Christie's on May 13, 2015 and Inferno, 183 x 183 cm, imitating block handwriting, for $ 2.2M including premium by Phillips on May 12, 2011. In these two works the words are white. With red letters, Didja?, 183 x 183 cm, was sold for $ 3.1M including premium by Sotheby's on November 17, 2016.
On October 6 in Hong Kong, Sotheby's sells Point Blank, acrylic and oil on canvas 183 x 183 cm painted in 1988, lot 1140 estimated HK $ 25M. Its block letters are red. The Point Blank thriller, released on screens in 1967, had been entirely shot in California.
From then on, Ruscha tirelessly positions words on more or less figurative images. This heterogeneous association has no meaning but it fascinates the viewer, as the assemblies of huge words by Christopher Wool will later do. Ruscha uses either single words that serve as slogans, or short sentences that include a contradiction, or movie titles.
Ruscha is living in Los Angeles since the late 1950s. From 1986 his City Lights series display an oblique perspective from an elevated viewpoint. The background of the image is a very dark night blue interrupted by the irregular lights of the perpendicular pattern of streets and their intersections. The letters are in very dark red on some opus and white on others. The title of the series is a reference to Chaplin.
I Tried to forget to remember, oil and acrylic on canvas 183 x 244 cm painted in 1986, was sold for $ 8.2M including premium by Sotheby's on May 16, 2019 over a lower estimate of $ 5M. The title paraphrases the "I Forgot to Remember to Forget" sung by Elvis Presley. The letters are red.
The series continues in 1987. Whiz kids, 168 x 168 cm, was sold for $ 4.2M including premium by Christie's on May 13, 2015 and Inferno, 183 x 183 cm, imitating block handwriting, for $ 2.2M including premium by Phillips on May 12, 2011. In these two works the words are white. With red letters, Didja?, 183 x 183 cm, was sold for $ 3.1M including premium by Sotheby's on November 17, 2016.
On October 6 in Hong Kong, Sotheby's sells Point Blank, acrylic and oil on canvas 183 x 183 cm painted in 1988, lot 1140 estimated HK $ 25M. Its block letters are red. The Point Blank thriller, released on screens in 1967, had been entirely shot in California.
1988 Jeff Koons, Apostle of Banality
2011 SOLD 3 M£ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
In 1988, a new artist arrives in the trendy galleries : Jeff Koons. His secret ? Reconciling the extremes : art and kitsch.
He is not the first to show humanized animals in puerile and grotesque attitudes. Those who missed their effect have produced shoddy work or garden gnomes. Those who have used this stratagem for more subtle purposes could have a dazzling success, as the talking animals of La Fontaine or the mice of Disney films.
Koons appropriates the Banality, and also gives that generic title to his 1988 theme. He produces a whole pantheon of works in polychromed wood, large size, usually in multiple copies, often perched on a high base.
Taken individually, each piece is an appalling idiocy. Taken together, they form a universe that openly questions the relationship between the elitism of art and the banality of everyday life. Through this approach, the Koons of 1988 is already a great artist, successor to the Pop Art and forerunner of Murakami.
Each work has got a precise place in this mythology. Thus the Winter Bears are Adam and Eve, the symbol of primordial ancestors. The couple of bears is dressed like the mountaineers in the Alps. Smiling and friendly, they join their hands by holding a small heart.
Winter Bears was produced in four copies including one artist's proof. The latter is for sale by Christie's in London on February 16. This sculpture 1.22 m high is estimated £ 2.5 M.
POST SALE COMMENT
Too kitschy to be great art, this group comes however just short of the £ 3M including premium.
In 1988, a new artist arrives in the trendy galleries : Jeff Koons. His secret ? Reconciling the extremes : art and kitsch.
He is not the first to show humanized animals in puerile and grotesque attitudes. Those who missed their effect have produced shoddy work or garden gnomes. Those who have used this stratagem for more subtle purposes could have a dazzling success, as the talking animals of La Fontaine or the mice of Disney films.
Koons appropriates the Banality, and also gives that generic title to his 1988 theme. He produces a whole pantheon of works in polychromed wood, large size, usually in multiple copies, often perched on a high base.
Taken individually, each piece is an appalling idiocy. Taken together, they form a universe that openly questions the relationship between the elitism of art and the banality of everyday life. Through this approach, the Koons of 1988 is already a great artist, successor to the Pop Art and forerunner of Murakami.
Each work has got a precise place in this mythology. Thus the Winter Bears are Adam and Eve, the symbol of primordial ancestors. The couple of bears is dressed like the mountaineers in the Alps. Smiling and friendly, they join their hands by holding a small heart.
Winter Bears was produced in four copies including one artist's proof. The latter is for sale by Christie's in London on February 16. This sculpture 1.22 m high is estimated £ 2.5 M.
POST SALE COMMENT
Too kitschy to be great art, this group comes however just short of the £ 3M including premium.
1988 The Endless Fall of Tyeb Mehta
2012 SOLD 1.8 MUS$ including premium
The falling figure with bird, for sale online by Saffronart from Mumbai on 19 and 20 September, is a masterpiece of Tyeb Mehta.
This oil on canvas, 150 x 119 cm, was made in 1988, when the artist was resident in Santiniketan.
The stylized bodies in an indistinguishable mixing remain consistent with the previous period. His stay in Santiniketan however brought Mehta a great creative impulse with the certainty that his art can become even more powerful.
He is freeing himself, like Bourgeois with her spiders. He views the strident colors becoming a major element of that expression of violence which haunts him since he was forced to witness some terrible events in his country.
Above all, his tangles bodies live an endless flight like interstellar objects in a black and midnight blue cosmos. He will continue until the end of his life to work on this apocalyptic theme.
Beautiful in the extreme simplicity of its composition, the painting is estimated U.S. $ 1.5 M.
POST SALE COMMENT
This painting is a masterpiece of Mehta. The result, $ 1.8 million including premium, is excellent but consistent with the estimate. Saffronart has perfectly mastered the pre-sale communication concerning this outstanding lot.
This oil on canvas, 150 x 119 cm, was made in 1988, when the artist was resident in Santiniketan.
The stylized bodies in an indistinguishable mixing remain consistent with the previous period. His stay in Santiniketan however brought Mehta a great creative impulse with the certainty that his art can become even more powerful.
He is freeing himself, like Bourgeois with her spiders. He views the strident colors becoming a major element of that expression of violence which haunts him since he was forced to witness some terrible events in his country.
Above all, his tangles bodies live an endless flight like interstellar objects in a black and midnight blue cosmos. He will continue until the end of his life to work on this apocalyptic theme.
Beautiful in the extreme simplicity of its composition, the painting is estimated U.S. $ 1.5 M.
POST SALE COMMENT
This painting is a masterpiece of Mehta. The result, $ 1.8 million including premium, is excellent but consistent with the estimate. Saffronart has perfectly mastered the pre-sale communication concerning this outstanding lot.
1988 The Bird of Difficult Pleasure
2020 SOLD for A$ 1.75M including premium
An artist since his childhood, Brett Whiteley seeks an unconventional relationship with society. In the studio, he watches like through distorting spectacles the naked body of Wendy, his wife and muse. Outside, the city is both appealing and dangerous.
In 1969 the young couple decides to live in Fiji. Facing the ocean, the artist imagines the solutions tried by Gauguin in Tahiti. He looks at the birds : they are carefree. After a few months Brett and Wendy are expelled from Fiji for drug possession.
Brett has success, including many exhibitions in Australia. He however viscerally remains a dissident. In 1988 he is appealed by the theme of Japan where he has never traveled. He now needs bright colors that only the ocean and the birds may deserve.
The Sunrise, Japanese, Good morning! is a synthesis of these themes. The naturalism of the bird is in contrast with the usual stylization by the artist.
This oil and collage on board with electric light, 244 x 205 cm, was twice sold by Menzies : for A $ 1.32M including premium on June 20, 2012, and for A $ 1.68M including premium on September, 21, 2016, lot 36. It is estimated A $ 1.5M for sale by the same auction house in Sydney on November 19, lot 33. Please watch the video shared by Menzies in 2016.
A hummingbird accosting a frangipani, oil and tempera on canvas 211 x 400 cm painted in the same year, was sold for A $ 2.04M including premium by Sotheby's on August 28, 2006.
In the following year, a television documentary titled Difficult Pleasure is commenting his life marred by drug addiction. He divorces from Wendy, loses now all his fights against schizophrenia and alcohol and dies in 1992 of a heroin overdose in a hotel room, aged 53.
In 1969 the young couple decides to live in Fiji. Facing the ocean, the artist imagines the solutions tried by Gauguin in Tahiti. He looks at the birds : they are carefree. After a few months Brett and Wendy are expelled from Fiji for drug possession.
Brett has success, including many exhibitions in Australia. He however viscerally remains a dissident. In 1988 he is appealed by the theme of Japan where he has never traveled. He now needs bright colors that only the ocean and the birds may deserve.
The Sunrise, Japanese, Good morning! is a synthesis of these themes. The naturalism of the bird is in contrast with the usual stylization by the artist.
This oil and collage on board with electric light, 244 x 205 cm, was twice sold by Menzies : for A $ 1.32M including premium on June 20, 2012, and for A $ 1.68M including premium on September, 21, 2016, lot 36. It is estimated A $ 1.5M for sale by the same auction house in Sydney on November 19, lot 33. Please watch the video shared by Menzies in 2016.
A hummingbird accosting a frangipani, oil and tempera on canvas 211 x 400 cm painted in the same year, was sold for A $ 2.04M including premium by Sotheby's on August 28, 2006.
In the following year, a television documentary titled Difficult Pleasure is commenting his life marred by drug addiction. He divorces from Wendy, loses now all his fights against schizophrenia and alcohol and dies in 1992 of a heroin overdose in a hotel room, aged 53.
1988 Chu Teh-chun dazzled by the Snow
2009 sold 35.2 M Tw$ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
It takes some practice to distinguish the works of the two French-Chinese painters, Zao Wou-ki and Chu Teh-chun, offered in the same auctions. Their abstractions are subtle continuous colors often arranged as splash.
They have much in common: born a year apart, both are members of the Academie des Beaux-Arts. Zao, who first arrived in Paris, has long been ahead of Chu on the art market. The sale by Christie's in Hong Kong on November 29 shows that now the important works of both artists are welcomed with equal enthusiasm by buyers.
In the mid '80s, the art of Chu became more distinctive. Stunned by the beauty of snow during an airplane flight over the Alps, he is then inspired in introducing the brightness of white in his compositions.
In Christie's sale mentioned above, a diptych of overall 2 x 4 m titled Vertige Neigeux was sold HK $ 45.5 million including premium.
On similar inspiration, an Evocation Hivernale of 1988, oil on canvas 195 x 130cm, is for sale on December 6 by Ravenel in Taipei. The estimate, which was published before the record at Christie's, is 30M Tw$. The auction house was kind enough to translate it into currencies that are most often used on the art market: 917K U.S. $ or 7.06 million HK $.
POST SALE COMMENT
The result, 35.2 MTw $ including premium, is consistent with the estimate. As above, here is the conversion indicated by the auction house: 8.5 MHK $, 1.1 MUS $.
By comparison, this price confirms the outstanding quality of the work sold at Christie's, which had the advantage of being a diptych.
It takes some practice to distinguish the works of the two French-Chinese painters, Zao Wou-ki and Chu Teh-chun, offered in the same auctions. Their abstractions are subtle continuous colors often arranged as splash.
They have much in common: born a year apart, both are members of the Academie des Beaux-Arts. Zao, who first arrived in Paris, has long been ahead of Chu on the art market. The sale by Christie's in Hong Kong on November 29 shows that now the important works of both artists are welcomed with equal enthusiasm by buyers.
In the mid '80s, the art of Chu became more distinctive. Stunned by the beauty of snow during an airplane flight over the Alps, he is then inspired in introducing the brightness of white in his compositions.
In Christie's sale mentioned above, a diptych of overall 2 x 4 m titled Vertige Neigeux was sold HK $ 45.5 million including premium.
On similar inspiration, an Evocation Hivernale of 1988, oil on canvas 195 x 130cm, is for sale on December 6 by Ravenel in Taipei. The estimate, which was published before the record at Christie's, is 30M Tw$. The auction house was kind enough to translate it into currencies that are most often used on the art market: 917K U.S. $ or 7.06 million HK $.
POST SALE COMMENT
The result, 35.2 MTw $ including premium, is consistent with the estimate. As above, here is the conversion indicated by the auction house: 8.5 MHK $, 1.1 MUS $.
By comparison, this price confirms the outstanding quality of the work sold at Christie's, which had the advantage of being a diptych.
1988 The Crumpled Canvas of Steven Parrino
2010 sold 458 K$ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
The minimalist art is sought after by fans, as demonstrated by the successful sale of the Lenz collection earlier this month at Sotheby's. This style which gives priority to the texture and brightness has also inspired successors up to current (or recent) days.
Phillips de Pury is one of the few auction houses that truly seek to promote contemporary art, and we must rejoice of that. On March 4 in New York, the star lot is a work of 1988 by Steven Parrino, 183 x 183 cm, entitled Scab Noggin.The artist died at age 46 on 1st January 2005 in a motorcycle accident.
The technique is original: the canvas is coated with acrylic, then twisted like a mop and laid as is on the chassis. The shiny paint contrasts with the four corners where the raw canvas background is visible. The contortion created regular draped lines with the same design chance as when Manzoni casted his kaolin achromes ... thirty years earlier.
At $ 400 K, will the collectors try it?
POST SALE COMMENT
This work has been sold: 380 K $ hammer price, 458 K $ including premium. The lower estimate was not reached. This confirms my opinion before the sale that the value of Parrino has no reason to be pushed up. His work is too connected to styles of the generation before him.
Here is the image of this lot in the catalog shared by the web hosting provider LiveAuctioneers.
The minimalist art is sought after by fans, as demonstrated by the successful sale of the Lenz collection earlier this month at Sotheby's. This style which gives priority to the texture and brightness has also inspired successors up to current (or recent) days.
Phillips de Pury is one of the few auction houses that truly seek to promote contemporary art, and we must rejoice of that. On March 4 in New York, the star lot is a work of 1988 by Steven Parrino, 183 x 183 cm, entitled Scab Noggin.The artist died at age 46 on 1st January 2005 in a motorcycle accident.
The technique is original: the canvas is coated with acrylic, then twisted like a mop and laid as is on the chassis. The shiny paint contrasts with the four corners where the raw canvas background is visible. The contortion created regular draped lines with the same design chance as when Manzoni casted his kaolin achromes ... thirty years earlier.
At $ 400 K, will the collectors try it?
POST SALE COMMENT
This work has been sold: 380 K $ hammer price, 458 K $ including premium. The lower estimate was not reached. This confirms my opinion before the sale that the value of Parrino has no reason to be pushed up. His work is too connected to styles of the generation before him.
Here is the image of this lot in the catalog shared by the web hosting provider LiveAuctioneers.
1988 by Ed Ruscha
2009 unsold
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Early this summer, Ed Ruscha is an artist to know. I just discussed him at Phillips de Pury, and here is a very different work as the top lot at Cierlak Clark Fine Arts on June 28 in Sherman Oaks, California.
It is an acrylic on paper made in 1988, entitled Electric Palette. This artwork shows a painter's palette with a few spots of color. The edges and spots are completely blurred.
From the same period, there are two interesting results in the archives of Christie's, both sold on 14 November 2007: Ship Talk, three blurred boats on the horizon, 1988, 140 x 338 cm, $ 1.8 million inclusive; and a blurred elephant climbing painfully a slope, 1986, 163 x 198 cm, $ 1.4 million including expenses.
Compared with previous works (including the one at Phillips de Pury), which provide such care to readability, these works are the exact opposite. Considering that the extremes can be joined, we conclude that they attest to the interest of the artist to research the sharpness.
Small, 83 x 60 cm, the work for sale by Clark Cierlak can not claim the high bids above. It is estimated 150 K $.
Early this summer, Ed Ruscha is an artist to know. I just discussed him at Phillips de Pury, and here is a very different work as the top lot at Cierlak Clark Fine Arts on June 28 in Sherman Oaks, California.
It is an acrylic on paper made in 1988, entitled Electric Palette. This artwork shows a painter's palette with a few spots of color. The edges and spots are completely blurred.
From the same period, there are two interesting results in the archives of Christie's, both sold on 14 November 2007: Ship Talk, three blurred boats on the horizon, 1988, 140 x 338 cm, $ 1.8 million inclusive; and a blurred elephant climbing painfully a slope, 1986, 163 x 198 cm, $ 1.4 million including expenses.
Compared with previous works (including the one at Phillips de Pury), which provide such care to readability, these works are the exact opposite. Considering that the extremes can be joined, we conclude that they attest to the interest of the artist to research the sharpness.
Small, 83 x 60 cm, the work for sale by Clark Cierlak can not claim the high bids above. It is estimated 150 K $.
1988-1989 the divine comedy of alighiero boetti
2016 unsold
In 1973 Alighiero Boetti left the Arte Povera movement. His art becomes more conceptual, opening an unprecedented path. The artist conceives the principles and algorithms of the artwork, he does not execute it. Boetti's maps have in common with Jasper Johns's US flags that the original and recognizable figure is copied without graphic changes.
The aim of Boetti is ambitious : designing and exhibiting the unity of the world built from individual elements that are inconsistent against one another. As early as 1975 he creates his first Tutto. From 1982, his works of this theme are made in embroidery, like his Mappa.
The artist chooses or let his team choosing within his catalog of tiny stencils the patterns for his next Tutto. The embroidery is done by an Afghan women's workshop that was later transferred to Peshawar in Pakistan. The workers have in hands threads in about one hundred different colors. They are commissioned to completely fill the surface of the canvas with these patterns and colors.
This long and careful execution is performed without any supervision by the artist who signs and dates the work once it is completed. He compares this design to the natural process by which minerals, plants and animals have been created from a state of disorder. As in thermodynamics, the distinction between the macroscopic state and the microscopic state enables to understand how and why the world seems consistent.
A large Tutto 128 x 235 cm made in 1988-1989 in Peshawar is estimated £ 1.8M for sale by Christie's in London on October 6, lot 148. A similar Tutto 125 x 266 cm dated 1988 was sold for £ 1,33M including premium by Christie's on October 14, 2011.
The aim of Boetti is ambitious : designing and exhibiting the unity of the world built from individual elements that are inconsistent against one another. As early as 1975 he creates his first Tutto. From 1982, his works of this theme are made in embroidery, like his Mappa.
The artist chooses or let his team choosing within his catalog of tiny stencils the patterns for his next Tutto. The embroidery is done by an Afghan women's workshop that was later transferred to Peshawar in Pakistan. The workers have in hands threads in about one hundred different colors. They are commissioned to completely fill the surface of the canvas with these patterns and colors.
This long and careful execution is performed without any supervision by the artist who signs and dates the work once it is completed. He compares this design to the natural process by which minerals, plants and animals have been created from a state of disorder. As in thermodynamics, the distinction between the macroscopic state and the microscopic state enables to understand how and why the world seems consistent.
A large Tutto 128 x 235 cm made in 1988-1989 in Peshawar is estimated £ 1.8M for sale by Christie's in London on October 6, lot 148. A similar Tutto 125 x 266 cm dated 1988 was sold for £ 1,33M including premium by Christie's on October 14, 2011.
1989 The Last Rainforest by Haring
2016 SOLD for £ 4.2M by Sotheby's
In the early 1980s, Street art appears as an alternative to the bourgeois circuit of museums and galleries. In an atmosphere exacerbated by the illegal acts, young artists express a need of upheaval of the established social order. They have no luck : at the same time AIDS comes to spoil the party.
Keith Haring is an activist. He is gay and claims the sexual freedom. Like so many other artists, he explores the mystery of life and death. He stages a multitude of faceless characters whose stylized bodies intertwine, destroying their biological identity and depersonalizing their crude activity.
Homophobia is now developing as a social interpretation of the new virus. The art of Keith is a permanent opposition against such assimilation. According to the environmentalist sensitivity of his time, he also protests against the irreversible degradation of the planet.
Keith knows to mix everything for strengthening his messages. Reading his art becomes a game in which the viewer is looking for his monsters and symbols within a dense pattern of drawings on a monochrome background. He retained the Art Brut of Dubuffet and anticipates Combas.
The disease advances too quickly in Keith's body. He wants to shout his message by using his very recognizable style in grandiose works. In 1989 he requires his gallerist to provide him one hundred large size canvases and a secret room where his friends will not disturb him. AIDS leaves him time to paint three canvases that will remain as the only witnesses of his apocalyptic creative burst.
On June 28, 2016, Sotheby's sold for £ 4.2M from a lower estimate of £ 2M The Last Rainforest, acrylic and enamel on canvas 182 x 243 cm from the collection of David LaChapelle, lot 15.
The symbols of all the threats and all the hopes are scattered on this image. The Radiant Baby, symbol of the artist himself and of the remains of his hopes, generates other infants who are climbing the trees of life.
Keith Haring is an activist. He is gay and claims the sexual freedom. Like so many other artists, he explores the mystery of life and death. He stages a multitude of faceless characters whose stylized bodies intertwine, destroying their biological identity and depersonalizing their crude activity.
Homophobia is now developing as a social interpretation of the new virus. The art of Keith is a permanent opposition against such assimilation. According to the environmentalist sensitivity of his time, he also protests against the irreversible degradation of the planet.
Keith knows to mix everything for strengthening his messages. Reading his art becomes a game in which the viewer is looking for his monsters and symbols within a dense pattern of drawings on a monochrome background. He retained the Art Brut of Dubuffet and anticipates Combas.
The disease advances too quickly in Keith's body. He wants to shout his message by using his very recognizable style in grandiose works. In 1989 he requires his gallerist to provide him one hundred large size canvases and a secret room where his friends will not disturb him. AIDS leaves him time to paint three canvases that will remain as the only witnesses of his apocalyptic creative burst.
On June 28, 2016, Sotheby's sold for £ 4.2M from a lower estimate of £ 2M The Last Rainforest, acrylic and enamel on canvas 182 x 243 cm from the collection of David LaChapelle, lot 15.
The symbols of all the threats and all the hopes are scattered on this image. The Radiant Baby, symbol of the artist himself and of the remains of his hopes, generates other infants who are climbing the trees of life.
1989 Advertising Thoughts of Ed Ruscha
2009 SOLD 710 K£ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Ed Ruscha enjoys Los Angeles for its ubiquitous advertising. It is the inspiration of his work. White capital letters imitating typography stand out on a uniform background. The letters are clean and neat: it is obvious that the artist is taking a major care on the readability of his message.
On 15 May 2008, Sotheby's in New York sold a little 1979 pastel, 58 x 74 cm, where the artist spread over three lines: "I DO NOT WANT NO RETRO SPECTIVE". I indicated in my blog that I found it in poor mood (presumptuous or vain). The market has seen it instead as an artistic manifesto. Estimated $ 1 million, it reached almost $ 4 million including premium.
On June 29 in London, Phillips de Pury is selling less aggressive thoughts: "THAT WAS THEN THIS IS NOW". Dating from 1989, it is in fact the title of a movie. The white letters stand out in two rows in front of a cloud pattern viewed against light. This oil on canvas 107 x 244 cm is a trailer, free and unframed in the sky over Los Angeles.
This picture more surprising than disturbing is estimated 600 K£.
POST SALE COMMENT
Good result, in accordance with the estimate: 710 K £ including premium.
Ed Ruscha enjoys Los Angeles for its ubiquitous advertising. It is the inspiration of his work. White capital letters imitating typography stand out on a uniform background. The letters are clean and neat: it is obvious that the artist is taking a major care on the readability of his message.
On 15 May 2008, Sotheby's in New York sold a little 1979 pastel, 58 x 74 cm, where the artist spread over three lines: "I DO NOT WANT NO RETRO SPECTIVE". I indicated in my blog that I found it in poor mood (presumptuous or vain). The market has seen it instead as an artistic manifesto. Estimated $ 1 million, it reached almost $ 4 million including premium.
On June 29 in London, Phillips de Pury is selling less aggressive thoughts: "THAT WAS THEN THIS IS NOW". Dating from 1989, it is in fact the title of a movie. The white letters stand out in two rows in front of a cloud pattern viewed against light. This oil on canvas 107 x 244 cm is a trailer, free and unframed in the sky over Los Angeles.
This picture more surprising than disturbing is estimated 600 K£.
POST SALE COMMENT
Good result, in accordance with the estimate: 710 K £ including premium.
1989 a presentation quilt to maya angelou
2015 sold for $ 460K including premium
Maya Angelou who died on May 28, 2014 was certainly the most respected figure in the African American community. This former music hall performer had worked for Dr. King and Malcolm X and was encouraged in her literary expression by James Baldwin. Poet, philosopher, teacher, she was a mentor to Oprah Winfrey.
This hypersensitive woman changed the conventions of autobiography. Her seven books in this genre are like dialogues which invite the reader to imagine how he would react to the trauma experienced by the author. The guilt she had suffered for several years after the murder of her rapist became through her writings a pedagogic case in child psychiatry.
This prophetess had a view on the intrinsic quality of art beyond the careers of artists and the opinions of critics, highlighting the example of the posthumous fame of van Gogh. She kept a collection of works of art often offered by her friends. This collection will be dispersed by Swann Galleries in New York on September 15. Remember that this auction house is the only one organizing periodic African American art sales.
For her 61st birthday in 1989, she was presented by Oprah Winfrey with a quilt made by another personality of the African American culture, Faith Ringgold.
Daughter of a fashion seamstress, Faith Ringgold mixes acrylic painting on canvas with pieces of dyed fabrics, in storied arrangements inspired by thangkas.
The work commissioned by Oprah Winfrey, 185 x 185 cm, is titled Maya's Quilt of Life. It is estimated $ 150K, lot 32. Maya 'Dr' Angelou is standing on a spring path, smiling, dressed in bright colors. The centerpiece of the artwork is flanked by two vertical columns of texts of tributes and quotes.
This hypersensitive woman changed the conventions of autobiography. Her seven books in this genre are like dialogues which invite the reader to imagine how he would react to the trauma experienced by the author. The guilt she had suffered for several years after the murder of her rapist became through her writings a pedagogic case in child psychiatry.
This prophetess had a view on the intrinsic quality of art beyond the careers of artists and the opinions of critics, highlighting the example of the posthumous fame of van Gogh. She kept a collection of works of art often offered by her friends. This collection will be dispersed by Swann Galleries in New York on September 15. Remember that this auction house is the only one organizing periodic African American art sales.
For her 61st birthday in 1989, she was presented by Oprah Winfrey with a quilt made by another personality of the African American culture, Faith Ringgold.
Daughter of a fashion seamstress, Faith Ringgold mixes acrylic painting on canvas with pieces of dyed fabrics, in storied arrangements inspired by thangkas.
The work commissioned by Oprah Winfrey, 185 x 185 cm, is titled Maya's Quilt of Life. It is estimated $ 150K, lot 32. Maya 'Dr' Angelou is standing on a spring path, smiling, dressed in bright colors. The centerpiece of the artwork is flanked by two vertical columns of texts of tributes and quotes.
1989 The Tribute of Ousmane Sow to Toussaint Louverture
2009 SOLD 238 K€ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
In 1999, Paris is suddenly aware of the Senegalese sculptor Ousmane Sow. The Pont des Arts, which is a narrow bridge closed to traffic, is suddenly adorned with a battle scene in which 23 characters and 8 horses are bigger than life. The subject is also political because it represents the Battle of Little Big Horn (1876), this extraordinary victory over Custer for which Crazy Horse became a symbol of the resistance of humiliated peoples. Sow is then acclaimed as the master of narrative sculpture.
Ten years earlier, in 1989, Paris celebrated the two hundredth anniversary of the French Revolution. In the same spirit as above, Sow had chosen the theme of the revolt of Toussaint Louverture for the liberation of slaves in Saint-Domingue (1798-1802). This movement inspired by the French Revolution failed when the French restored slavery by force, but he remained one of the most powerful symbols of the fight against this scourge.
Sow's statue, 2.20 meter high, is composed of mixed straw and jute on a frame of iron, using the technique developed by the artist. A standing Toussaint Louverture comforts an old woman sitting on ground who is symbolizing slavery.
The sale of this work on June 1 in Paris is organized by the auction house Gaïa. Founded in 2007, it specializes in non-Western arts. The estimate indicated in the catalog is 150 K €, but there is no real history of such works at auction. The database Artvalue provides only two results, both obtained on bronzes.
POST SALE COMMENT
Sold 197 K € before fees. It is a very good result for the artist, and an excellent result for this small auction house.
In 1999, Paris is suddenly aware of the Senegalese sculptor Ousmane Sow. The Pont des Arts, which is a narrow bridge closed to traffic, is suddenly adorned with a battle scene in which 23 characters and 8 horses are bigger than life. The subject is also political because it represents the Battle of Little Big Horn (1876), this extraordinary victory over Custer for which Crazy Horse became a symbol of the resistance of humiliated peoples. Sow is then acclaimed as the master of narrative sculpture.
Ten years earlier, in 1989, Paris celebrated the two hundredth anniversary of the French Revolution. In the same spirit as above, Sow had chosen the theme of the revolt of Toussaint Louverture for the liberation of slaves in Saint-Domingue (1798-1802). This movement inspired by the French Revolution failed when the French restored slavery by force, but he remained one of the most powerful symbols of the fight against this scourge.
Sow's statue, 2.20 meter high, is composed of mixed straw and jute on a frame of iron, using the technique developed by the artist. A standing Toussaint Louverture comforts an old woman sitting on ground who is symbolizing slavery.
The sale of this work on June 1 in Paris is organized by the auction house Gaïa. Founded in 2007, it specializes in non-Western arts. The estimate indicated in the catalog is 150 K €, but there is no real history of such works at auction. The database Artvalue provides only two results, both obtained on bronzes.
POST SALE COMMENT
Sold 197 K € before fees. It is a very good result for the artist, and an excellent result for this small auction house.
1989 Gravitation Law challenged by Richard Serra
2009 unsold
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
If we define art as a creative act that generates emotion, the American Richard Serra is a great artist. He works in steel, in the form of plates and beams. Geometrically, we can not be simpler than these.
But he assembles in a manner that places them at the edge of instability. Seeing these heavy objects in such unlikely positions, without base, the visitor is affected by an intense emotion: a basic fear that the work collapses just now. A rust color, which is added with the brush by the artist, is increasing the apparent fragility of these huge structures.
Without leaving Sotheby's New York, let us consider three works by Serra.
On 11 November 2008, 12-4-8, executed in 1983, was sold $ 1.65 million including expenses. Three plates, 150 x 150 x 3.8 cm each, are standing, regularly distributed around a vertical axis. But they are leaning a few degrees, like a house of cards.
On 14 November 2007, Even Level, executed in 1987, was sold $ 1.5 million including expenses. It is made of two beams of the same size, 183 x 10 x20 cm. One of them is standing, the other is horizontal, set on the first. The standing beam is leaning, ready to fall.
Square Bar Choker, executed in 1989, will be on sale on May 12. The thin plate, 152 x 152 x 5 cm, is standing. A large bar, 23 x 23 x 152 cm, is placed above it, parallel but decentred, ending 65 cm beyond the edge of the plate. To offer chills of anxiety for your visitors, anticipate $ 1.5 million.
There is no doubt that Richard Serra is a skilled geometer.
If we define art as a creative act that generates emotion, the American Richard Serra is a great artist. He works in steel, in the form of plates and beams. Geometrically, we can not be simpler than these.
But he assembles in a manner that places them at the edge of instability. Seeing these heavy objects in such unlikely positions, without base, the visitor is affected by an intense emotion: a basic fear that the work collapses just now. A rust color, which is added with the brush by the artist, is increasing the apparent fragility of these huge structures.
Without leaving Sotheby's New York, let us consider three works by Serra.
On 11 November 2008, 12-4-8, executed in 1983, was sold $ 1.65 million including expenses. Three plates, 150 x 150 x 3.8 cm each, are standing, regularly distributed around a vertical axis. But they are leaning a few degrees, like a house of cards.
On 14 November 2007, Even Level, executed in 1987, was sold $ 1.5 million including expenses. It is made of two beams of the same size, 183 x 10 x20 cm. One of them is standing, the other is horizontal, set on the first. The standing beam is leaning, ready to fall.
Square Bar Choker, executed in 1989, will be on sale on May 12. The thin plate, 152 x 152 x 5 cm, is standing. A large bar, 23 x 23 x 152 cm, is placed above it, parallel but decentred, ending 65 cm beyond the edge of the plate. To offer chills of anxiety for your visitors, anticipate $ 1.5 million.
There is no doubt that Richard Serra is a skilled geometer.
