1948
See also : Art on paper Abstract art II Giacometti Giacometti 1947-54 Still Pollock Calder Patek Philippe 1945-1980
1948 The Organic Abstraction of Jackson Pollock
2013 SOLD 58 M$ including premium
In 1946, Lee Krasner pushes Jackson Pollock to a secluded barn on Long Island. Thus freed from the bustle of the big city, Pollock has the luck to live his artistic Passion, in the strongest meaning of the word 'passion'.
He did not consider himself as an abstract artist. In the first months after his arrival in Long Island, he developed two series of paintings titled 'Sounds in the grass' and 'Accabonac Creek', reflecting his desire to commune with the earth for expressing its richness.
He then invented his own style so well known today but then so different from anything that existed before him. The surface to be painted is placed on the ground and not on an easel. He leaves his brushes to directly throw the liquid paint. There is no horizon and no framing even when the work is small, and there is also no longer a figuration.
The lines of pure colors of various widths form infinite and meticulous tangles. Sometimes, the start of the work is figurative before being hidden, but it is not the most important. The regularity of the final mesh is spectacular without being total, so that certain areas are breathing or vibrating such as an organic matter. Only Richter's rake will be able to generate similar effects.
On May 15 in New York, Christie's sells Number 19, 1948. This oil and enamel on paper mounted on canvas is small, 78 x 57 cm, but the fineness of the line is prodigious. Such a technical and artistic achievement deserves an estimate of $ 25M.
I invite you to watch the exciting video shared by Christie's.
POST SALE COMMENT
Despite its small size, Number 19-1948 is a masterpiece of Pollock by the extreme care of its realization. This painting was sold $ 58M including premium.
He did not consider himself as an abstract artist. In the first months after his arrival in Long Island, he developed two series of paintings titled 'Sounds in the grass' and 'Accabonac Creek', reflecting his desire to commune with the earth for expressing its richness.
He then invented his own style so well known today but then so different from anything that existed before him. The surface to be painted is placed on the ground and not on an easel. He leaves his brushes to directly throw the liquid paint. There is no horizon and no framing even when the work is small, and there is also no longer a figuration.
The lines of pure colors of various widths form infinite and meticulous tangles. Sometimes, the start of the work is figurative before being hidden, but it is not the most important. The regularity of the final mesh is spectacular without being total, so that certain areas are breathing or vibrating such as an organic matter. Only Richter's rake will be able to generate similar effects.
On May 15 in New York, Christie's sells Number 19, 1948. This oil and enamel on paper mounted on canvas is small, 78 x 57 cm, but the fineness of the line is prodigious. Such a technical and artistic achievement deserves an estimate of $ 25M.
I invite you to watch the exciting video shared by Christie's.
POST SALE COMMENT
Despite its small size, Number 19-1948 is a masterpiece of Pollock by the extreme care of its realization. This painting was sold $ 58M including premium.
1948 PH-125 by Clyfford Still
2021 SOLD for $ 31M by Sotheby's
PH-125, also titled 1948-No.1, oil on canvas 187 x 173 cm by Still, was sold for $ 31M by Sotheby's on May 12, 2021, lot 8. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
Its unlimited massive form is made of a richly saturated texture in various deep hues from gold to amber with a yellow jagged interstice. In the opposite of many other works by Still, it looks static and swelling except for its overlap by a deep red form on its right side.
A color photo in the catalogue shows it on the wall of a 1990 exhibition beside the fully static and larger opus PH-91, 240 x 200 cm, painted in the same year with the same pigments. Both appear like a demonstration of the artist's capability to offer an unprecedented mingle of rare colors, anticipating and possibly inspiring Rothko's rectangular forms.
It is one of the early works which were included in the 1969 selling exhibition at the Marlborough gallery in New York.
Its unlimited massive form is made of a richly saturated texture in various deep hues from gold to amber with a yellow jagged interstice. In the opposite of many other works by Still, it looks static and swelling except for its overlap by a deep red form on its right side.
A color photo in the catalogue shows it on the wall of a 1990 exhibition beside the fully static and larger opus PH-91, 240 x 200 cm, painted in the same year with the same pigments. Both appear like a demonstration of the artist's capability to offer an unprecedented mingle of rare colors, anticipating and possibly inspiring Rothko's rectangular forms.
It is one of the early works which were included in the 1969 selling exhibition at the Marlborough gallery in New York.
1948 The Inner Path of Clyfford Still
2016 SOLD for $ 28M including premium
Born in North Dakota far away from the cities, Clyfford Still is deeply original in his art. Along with Matta he is one of the earliest abstract painters to remove any geometric language and all false references to figurative themes or hermetic signs.
In front of the canvas, Still expresses his inner world beyond the influence of time. His thick paint is thoroughly reworked like a sculpture including extra thickness and scars until the color balance and the texture match the feeling that the artist wishes to express.
Like Mondrian, Still refuses that the vision is limited by the frame : he will influence Pollock. Like no one before him in abstract art, Still removes the line to provide to the viewer an almost organic vision of the transitions between colors : Monet was on that trend at the end of his career, and Still will influence Rothko. Like Malevich, Still considers that the artwork must be self-sufficient.
Clyfford Still is decidedly a man of the West. In his period of greatest creativity, from 1946 to 1950, he taught art in San Francisco. His return to New York will cause lasting quarrels with the art market and with the other artists. This pioneer who had everything to become the top abstract artist of his time isolated himself and refused the exhibitions.
He was reluctant to sell his art. At his death 2400 works were bequeathed to his family with the formal instructions to only entrust them to a place that will accept to devote an exclusive museum to him. The widow is quite logically looking for a solution in the West. Denver brilliantly accepts this challenge.
Before the opening of the Clyfford Still Museum, four paintings are released to the art market, creating an intense interest due to the extreme rarity of the masterpieces of this artist at auction. Sotheby's sells them on November 9, 2011. 1947-Y-No.2, 177 x 150 cm, fetches $ 31,5M including premium and 1949-A-No.1, 236 x 200 cm, $ 61,7M including premium.
On May 10 in New York, Christie's sells PH-234, oil on canvas 175 x 151 cm painted in 1948, estimated $ 25M, lot 28B.
In front of the canvas, Still expresses his inner world beyond the influence of time. His thick paint is thoroughly reworked like a sculpture including extra thickness and scars until the color balance and the texture match the feeling that the artist wishes to express.
Like Mondrian, Still refuses that the vision is limited by the frame : he will influence Pollock. Like no one before him in abstract art, Still removes the line to provide to the viewer an almost organic vision of the transitions between colors : Monet was on that trend at the end of his career, and Still will influence Rothko. Like Malevich, Still considers that the artwork must be self-sufficient.
Clyfford Still is decidedly a man of the West. In his period of greatest creativity, from 1946 to 1950, he taught art in San Francisco. His return to New York will cause lasting quarrels with the art market and with the other artists. This pioneer who had everything to become the top abstract artist of his time isolated himself and refused the exhibitions.
He was reluctant to sell his art. At his death 2400 works were bequeathed to his family with the formal instructions to only entrust them to a place that will accept to devote an exclusive museum to him. The widow is quite logically looking for a solution in the West. Denver brilliantly accepts this challenge.
Before the opening of the Clyfford Still Museum, four paintings are released to the art market, creating an intense interest due to the extreme rarity of the masterpieces of this artist at auction. Sotheby's sells them on November 9, 2011. 1947-Y-No.2, 177 x 150 cm, fetches $ 31,5M including premium and 1949-A-No.1, 236 x 200 cm, $ 61,7M including premium.
On May 10 in New York, Christie's sells PH-234, oil on canvas 175 x 151 cm painted in 1948, estimated $ 25M, lot 28B.
1948 La Main by Giacometti
2010 SOLD for $ 26M including premium by Christie's
narrated in 2014 before the auction of another copy by Christie's (see below)
In 1946, Alberto Giacometti is not satisfied with his own art. His plaster figurines are expressive but too small. Haunted by the conjunction of death memories and of nightmares, he abandons the realistic figure of the body for a new wire-drawn disproportion.
1947 is his great year of creativity, including L'homme qui marche (walking man) who was to remain his most powerful work, the masterpiece of the derision of man in his loneliness.
The flesh is a mystery that has no meaning after death. All organs may contribute to the expression. The mouth in his Head on rod is wide open in the agony. The sculpture entitled La Main is actually a hand with long opened fingers at the end of a complete folded arm also mounted on a rod.
A hand does not require the rest of the body for expressing a passion. This asexual hand holds nothing. Fingers crave but the wide opening of the elbow is a gesture of hope.
Pierre Matisse appreciates that Alberto has become one of the most important artists of his time. With the financial participation of Matisse, Giacometti can commission bronzes of his new works to the best foundry in Paris, the Alexis Rudier workshop.
The serial number 1 of the first edition cast by Rudier in 1947 was part of the seminal exhibition of the new art of Giacometti opened by Matisse in New York on January 19, 1948. This bronze with brown patina 57 x 72 x 3.5 cm passed at Christie's on June 24, 2014, from a lower estimate of £ 10M.
A bronze of La Main in the same dimension with brown and green patina cast by Rudier in March 1948 was sold for $ 26M including premium by Christie's on May 4, 2010, lot 30, from a lower estimate of $ 10M.
1947 is his great year of creativity, including L'homme qui marche (walking man) who was to remain his most powerful work, the masterpiece of the derision of man in his loneliness.
The flesh is a mystery that has no meaning after death. All organs may contribute to the expression. The mouth in his Head on rod is wide open in the agony. The sculpture entitled La Main is actually a hand with long opened fingers at the end of a complete folded arm also mounted on a rod.
A hand does not require the rest of the body for expressing a passion. This asexual hand holds nothing. Fingers crave but the wide opening of the elbow is a gesture of hope.
Pierre Matisse appreciates that Alberto has become one of the most important artists of his time. With the financial participation of Matisse, Giacometti can commission bronzes of his new works to the best foundry in Paris, the Alexis Rudier workshop.
The serial number 1 of the first edition cast by Rudier in 1947 was part of the seminal exhibition of the new art of Giacometti opened by Matisse in New York on January 19, 1948. This bronze with brown patina 57 x 72 x 3.5 cm passed at Christie's on June 24, 2014, from a lower estimate of £ 10M.
A bronze of La Main in the same dimension with brown and green patina cast by Rudier in March 1948 was sold for $ 26M including premium by Christie's on May 4, 2010, lot 30, from a lower estimate of $ 10M.
1948 And Alberto created Woman
2017 SOLD for £ 18M including premium
After the war Alberto Giacometti reinstalled himself in his Parisian studio which had been carefully maintained by Diego. His life is stabilized by his meeting with Annette. He wants to exhibit through his sculptures his own view about the human nature, close to Sartre's existentialism.
His threadlike characters are both fragile in their bodies and solid in their bronze. These humans are not identifiable but the original plaster tirelessly kneaded by the artist's hand brings them a tormented texture that resembles their creator.
Pierre Matisse is seduced but cannot wait. Alberto achieves in 1947 in a hurry which is not his usual practice his primordial trilogy dominated by the Man with the finger. The other two elements are the Walking man with his compass shaped legs prophesying the imbalance of the future, and his opposite the everlasting Standing woman.
Other figures will soon be created as well as groups and busts. The attitude of the frail and stoic woman will remain unchanged throughout Alberto's career as if this perfectionist artist had at first found how to express the timeless woman. With her strictly joined legs she is inspired from the Egyptian anthropomorphic coffins. Gilt or perched on a chariot to be worshiped, she is the mother goddess of Alberto's surrealist pantheon.
On June 21 in London, Sotheby's sells Grande Figure, a bronze 1.30m high in a patina of dark gold color. Cast as a unique copy by the Alexis Rudier company in Paris in 1948 from a plaster dated 1947, it is one of the earliest large size examples of Alberto's standing woman. It is estimated £ 15M, lot 57.
His threadlike characters are both fragile in their bodies and solid in their bronze. These humans are not identifiable but the original plaster tirelessly kneaded by the artist's hand brings them a tormented texture that resembles their creator.
Pierre Matisse is seduced but cannot wait. Alberto achieves in 1947 in a hurry which is not his usual practice his primordial trilogy dominated by the Man with the finger. The other two elements are the Walking man with his compass shaped legs prophesying the imbalance of the future, and his opposite the everlasting Standing woman.
Other figures will soon be created as well as groups and busts. The attitude of the frail and stoic woman will remain unchanged throughout Alberto's career as if this perfectionist artist had at first found how to express the timeless woman. With her strictly joined legs she is inspired from the Egyptian anthropomorphic coffins. Gilt or perched on a chariot to be worshiped, she is the mother goddess of Alberto's surrealist pantheon.
On June 21 in London, Sotheby's sells Grande Figure, a bronze 1.30m high in a patina of dark gold color. Cast as a unique copy by the Alexis Rudier company in Paris in 1948 from a plaster dated 1947, it is one of the earliest large size examples of Alberto's standing woman. It is estimated £ 15M, lot 57.
1948 Two Goddesses by Fu Baoshi
2020 SOLD for RMB 105M including premium by Poly
SOLD on December 4, 2020, lot 0639
1948 The Key was in the Forest
2011 SOLD 10.7 M£ including premium
Great artists are building their own universe. In 1948, Alberto Giacometti chose this wire-like style that will constitute his trademark and began the theme of the man who walks, or who is trying to walk.
Some are shown in groups. The Trois hommes qui marchent I (three walking men I) will soon be telescoped. Three walking men II are leaving from each other in a contradictory movement, for which a moment before is impossible. It is a powerful work, which reminds that the artist had been tempted by surrealism.
Also in 1948, la Place (the square) shows five characters further apart, expressing the loneliness of every man in the crowd.
This great creative impulse will be achieved through the exhibition of works at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in 1950. La Forêt (the forest) and La Clairière (the glade) provide a coherent meaning to the whole. They are designed like the square, but impersonal trees have superseded the men. The arms and legs are united with the body but the head is still outlined at the top of the tree. Not only each man is alone, but in addition he is nothing.
On June 22 in London, Sotheby's sells a copy of the Trois hommes qui marchent II cast by Alexis Rudier company as early as 1948. This bronze with a rich brown patina, 76 cm high, once belonged to Pierre Matisse. It is estimated £ 10M.
POST SALE COMMENT
I was hoping that this bronze would exceed its estimate, but it remained reasonable. It was sold £ 10.7 million including premium.
Some are shown in groups. The Trois hommes qui marchent I (three walking men I) will soon be telescoped. Three walking men II are leaving from each other in a contradictory movement, for which a moment before is impossible. It is a powerful work, which reminds that the artist had been tempted by surrealism.
Also in 1948, la Place (the square) shows five characters further apart, expressing the loneliness of every man in the crowd.
This great creative impulse will be achieved through the exhibition of works at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in 1950. La Forêt (the forest) and La Clairière (the glade) provide a coherent meaning to the whole. They are designed like the square, but impersonal trees have superseded the men. The arms and legs are united with the body but the head is still outlined at the top of the tree. Not only each man is alone, but in addition he is nothing.
On June 22 in London, Sotheby's sells a copy of the Trois hommes qui marchent II cast by Alexis Rudier company as early as 1948. This bronze with a rich brown patina, 76 cm high, once belonged to Pierre Matisse. It is estimated £ 10M.
POST SALE COMMENT
I was hoping that this bronze would exceed its estimate, but it remained reasonable. It was sold £ 10.7 million including premium.
1948 La Serpentine by Matisse
2000 SOLD for $ 14M by Sotheby's
55 cm high. Cast in 1948 from an edition of 10 and 1 artist's proof started in 1910.
Sold for $ 14M by Sotheby's on May 10, 2000, lot 25.
Sold for $ 14M by Sotheby's on May 10, 2000, lot 25.
1948 Five Characters in Search of an Artist
2014 SOLD 13 M$ including premium
After the war, Alberto Giacometti creates and operates his own universe through the sculpture. He establishes rules that he will remarkably respect in his later work : man is walking, woman is still.
Man is walking with energy but nobody knows why, not even the character. The energy of his step is useful, or not. He is fragile. The woman is waiting and passive. She however must have a role, like the tree in the forest.
All these people may live at the same place. This does not mean that they will communicate with each other. In 1948, Alberto expresses this paradox in his first sculpture with multiple figures, La Place I.
Four men and a woman play their comedy on a rectangular platform 62 cm long. They are small and scattered, giving an impression of great void. It is easy to recognize among them the most iconic silhouette of all Alberto's characters, L'Homme qui marche, of which a large size later bronze held during a few months the absolute record price of a work of art at auction.
One from six bronzes of La Place I cast by Alexis Rudier company in 1948 is estimated beyond $ 12M, for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 7. Despite its small size, the estimate seems low for such a seminal work in Alberto's art.
Other groups had quickly followed La Place I, as if Alberto was desperately trying to find a logical order of the humanity. La Place II pushed the same five characters close to one edge of the platform. With Les Trois hommes qui marchent, the lack of communication leads to collision. The trees from La Forêt and La Clairière have the same proportions as the standing women.
I invite you to play the video in which Sotheby's announces five Giacometti artworks listed in the next sale.
POST SALE COMMENT
The result, $ 13M including premium, is in line with the lower estimate.
Man is walking with energy but nobody knows why, not even the character. The energy of his step is useful, or not. He is fragile. The woman is waiting and passive. She however must have a role, like the tree in the forest.
All these people may live at the same place. This does not mean that they will communicate with each other. In 1948, Alberto expresses this paradox in his first sculpture with multiple figures, La Place I.
Four men and a woman play their comedy on a rectangular platform 62 cm long. They are small and scattered, giving an impression of great void. It is easy to recognize among them the most iconic silhouette of all Alberto's characters, L'Homme qui marche, of which a large size later bronze held during a few months the absolute record price of a work of art at auction.
One from six bronzes of La Place I cast by Alexis Rudier company in 1948 is estimated beyond $ 12M, for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 7. Despite its small size, the estimate seems low for such a seminal work in Alberto's art.
Other groups had quickly followed La Place I, as if Alberto was desperately trying to find a logical order of the humanity. La Place II pushed the same five characters close to one edge of the platform. With Les Trois hommes qui marchent, the lack of communication leads to collision. The trees from La Forêt and La Clairière have the same proportions as the standing women.
I invite you to play the video in which Sotheby's announces five Giacometti artworks listed in the next sale.
POST SALE COMMENT
The result, $ 13M including premium, is in line with the lower estimate.
1948-1949 The Blazing Hell of Clyfford Still
2016 SOLD for $ 13.7M including premium
Clyfford Still is a pioneer. He does not need anyone to develop a new art. Art teacher in San Francisco from 1946 to 1950 he had a considerable influence which will long be underestimated. In the fierce isolation of his last thirty years he tirelessly continues painting to release his existential impulses.
Obsessed with the theme of the fight between life and death, Still had given up a morbid figuration. He works the blazing colors of hell in an impasto laid on the canvas with a knife. His abstract art is a burst that produces a psychedelic glow. He alternately defined it as an explosion or as an implosion.
The black of death and the red of vitality are juxtaposed with a great violence until they reach a balance that will ever remain precarious, like a sheared curtain. The other colors are subsidiaries to these two key elements. In a powerful tendency of exacerbating the vertical, these abstract scenes often in large size can be observed from bottom up like a mystical painting by El Greco.
On November 16 in New York, Phillips sells an oil on canvas 140 x 106 cm painted circa 1948 or 1949, lot 9 estimated $ 12M.
This unnumbered opus escaped the large corpus of Still's work now kept in the Denver Museum because he presented it in 1951 to one of his best students. Before this friendly disposal the artist had reworked this painting to drown within the deep red a few bright spots that could contradict the force.
This creator has provided to his fellows and his competitors the basics of abstract expressionism. He covers like Pollock the surfaces that he considered as unachieved. He gets in the boundaries between the colored blocks a shredding illusion that anticipates Rothko. The Homeric struggles for vital power between the dominant elements anticipate the creations of the world by Barnett Newman.
Obsessed with the theme of the fight between life and death, Still had given up a morbid figuration. He works the blazing colors of hell in an impasto laid on the canvas with a knife. His abstract art is a burst that produces a psychedelic glow. He alternately defined it as an explosion or as an implosion.
The black of death and the red of vitality are juxtaposed with a great violence until they reach a balance that will ever remain precarious, like a sheared curtain. The other colors are subsidiaries to these two key elements. In a powerful tendency of exacerbating the vertical, these abstract scenes often in large size can be observed from bottom up like a mystical painting by El Greco.
On November 16 in New York, Phillips sells an oil on canvas 140 x 106 cm painted circa 1948 or 1949, lot 9 estimated $ 12M.
This unnumbered opus escaped the large corpus of Still's work now kept in the Denver Museum because he presented it in 1951 to one of his best students. Before this friendly disposal the artist had reworked this painting to drown within the deep red a few bright spots that could contradict the force.
This creator has provided to his fellows and his competitors the basics of abstract expressionism. He covers like Pollock the surfaces that he considered as unachieved. He gets in the boundaries between the colored blocks a shredding illusion that anticipates Rothko. The Homeric struggles for vital power between the dominant elements anticipate the creations of the world by Barnett Newman.
1948 Mobile by Calder
2021 SOLD for $ 11.3M by Sotheby's
Around 1948 Alexander Calder manages elegantly curved forms in the structure of his fully balanced hanging mobiles, some of them being kinetic feats.
An untitled mobile made of a suite of ten plates suspended to the ceiling by a single de-centered wire provides an impression of a weightless horizontal figure.
This piece 293 cm long with narrow height and depth was made of unpainted metal elements carefully adjusted in their amorphous shapes. Two of them had needed two holes each to maintain the balance.
This ethereal mobile was sold for $ 11.3M from a lower estimate of $ 4.5M by Sotheby's on May 12, 2021, lot 111.
An untitled mobile made of a suite of ten plates suspended to the ceiling by a single de-centered wire provides an impression of a weightless horizontal figure.
This piece 293 cm long with narrow height and depth was made of unpainted metal elements carefully adjusted in their amorphous shapes. Two of them had needed two holes each to maintain the balance.
This ethereal mobile was sold for $ 11.3M from a lower estimate of $ 4.5M by Sotheby's on May 12, 2021, lot 111.
1948-H by Clyfford Still
2012 SOLD for $ 9.9M by Sotheby's
1948-H by Still features two tiny bright lightnings over a dark background in various rich tones. This oil on canvas 190 x 177 cm was sold by Sotheby's on November 13, 2012 for $ 9.9M, lot 14.
