1969
See also : Top 10 Painting Art on paper Women artists Art by women ca 1960 England Bacon UK II Twombly Picasso from 1940 Chagall Japan and Korea The Man Groups Cities
1969 How Bacon caught Freud
2013 SOLD 142 M$ including premium
As early as 1944, the triptych is the favorite medium of Bacon. The three perspectives cancel the plane of the canvas to provide to the viewer the mental illusion of a three-dimensional space.
Heads in small sizes often come to auction, but larger works are exceptional. On November 12 in New York, Christie's sells Three Studies of Lucian Freud, three oils on canvas painted in 1969, 198 x 148 cm for each element.
The two artists have been friends for nearly a quarter of century. Francis is in his George Dyer period and his appeal to Lucian has no reason to be erotic. Always looking for a total empathy with his entourage, Bacon pays tribute to a rival whom he admires. The seating position is gentle, but the colors and deformities of the face express the passions, in front of a strident yellow background.
Bacon locked Freud in a threadlike prism, similar to a squaring but proving his intent of the three-dimensional nature of the triptych. This desire to control his friend is fictional and symbolic because Bacon, as almost every time, worked this triple portrait from photos made by John Deakin.
Christie's does not indicate an estimate but compares the importance of this work with the triptych of the same size sold for $ 86M including premium by Sotheby's on 14 May 2008. Painted in 1976, this work is more symbolic but also less three-dimensional due to the decomposition of the body in the central picture.
I invite you to play the video shared by Christie's.
POST SALE COMMENT
The auction sale of this triptych was an important event that Christie's has successfully managed : sold for $ 142M including premium.
The low resolution image below is shared by Wikimedia for fair use :
Heads in small sizes often come to auction, but larger works are exceptional. On November 12 in New York, Christie's sells Three Studies of Lucian Freud, three oils on canvas painted in 1969, 198 x 148 cm for each element.
The two artists have been friends for nearly a quarter of century. Francis is in his George Dyer period and his appeal to Lucian has no reason to be erotic. Always looking for a total empathy with his entourage, Bacon pays tribute to a rival whom he admires. The seating position is gentle, but the colors and deformities of the face express the passions, in front of a strident yellow background.
Bacon locked Freud in a threadlike prism, similar to a squaring but proving his intent of the three-dimensional nature of the triptych. This desire to control his friend is fictional and symbolic because Bacon, as almost every time, worked this triple portrait from photos made by John Deakin.
Christie's does not indicate an estimate but compares the importance of this work with the triptych of the same size sold for $ 86M including premium by Sotheby's on 14 May 2008. Painted in 1976, this work is more symbolic but also less three-dimensional due to the decomposition of the body in the central picture.
I invite you to play the video shared by Christie's.
POST SALE COMMENT
The auction sale of this triptych was an important event that Christie's has successfully managed : sold for $ 142M including premium.
The low resolution image below is shared by Wikimedia for fair use :
1969 Curator and Partner
2019 SOLD for £ 38M including premium
Looking for sexual freedom, David Hockney arrives in California in 1964. The easy life nevertheless does not answer his questioning about communication within a couple.
Between 1968 and 1977 he makes double portraits in very large format, 214 x 305 cm. He alternates between homosexual and heterosexual couples and ends the series with his own parents, clearly assessing that his concern is no longer sex but dialogue. The sitters are most often identified in the title and are very recognizable.
Invariably the two characters are distant from each other with a deliberately orthogonal gazing. In this strange intimacy, the painter is an invisible social voyeur.
Installed again in London in 1968, he does not neglect America. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is preparing a major exhibition that will reveal post-war American art to the general public. The curator of this important cultural operation is the highly influential Henry Geldzahler.
Hockney arrives in Geldzahler's living room in Manhattan with his sketchbook, polaroid camera and flu. Back in his studio in London, he paints in 1969 'Henry Geldzahler and Christopher Scott'. This acrylic on canvas will be sold by Christie's in London on March 6, lot 8. The December 17 press release announces an estimate in excess of £ 30M.
The two men could not be more dissimilar and yet their life as a couple is sustainable. Robust and confident in himself, Geldzahler is comfortably seated in the middle of a beautiful sofa worthy of the greatest Art Deco collections. On the right, his young partner is standing, dressed in a raincoat too big for him and as stiff as the floor lamp. The scene is located by the skyscrapers beyond the small window.
Between 1968 and 1977 he makes double portraits in very large format, 214 x 305 cm. He alternates between homosexual and heterosexual couples and ends the series with his own parents, clearly assessing that his concern is no longer sex but dialogue. The sitters are most often identified in the title and are very recognizable.
Invariably the two characters are distant from each other with a deliberately orthogonal gazing. In this strange intimacy, the painter is an invisible social voyeur.
Installed again in London in 1968, he does not neglect America. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is preparing a major exhibition that will reveal post-war American art to the general public. The curator of this important cultural operation is the highly influential Henry Geldzahler.
Hockney arrives in Geldzahler's living room in Manhattan with his sketchbook, polaroid camera and flu. Back in his studio in London, he paints in 1969 'Henry Geldzahler and Christopher Scott'. This acrylic on canvas will be sold by Christie's in London on March 6, lot 8. The December 17 press release announces an estimate in excess of £ 30M.
The two men could not be more dissimilar and yet their life as a couple is sustainable. Robust and confident in himself, Geldzahler is comfortably seated in the middle of a beautiful sofa worthy of the greatest Art Deco collections. On the right, his young partner is standing, dressed in a raincoat too big for him and as stiff as the floor lamp. The scene is located by the skyscrapers beyond the small window.
1969 Twombly in Bolsena
2015 SOLD for $ 43M including premium
Cy Twombly went to locate his artworks instead of attributing a title. This practice allows us now to consider how much his stay in Bolsena from May to October 1969 marked a turning point in his art.
Bolsena is in the former Latium but Twombly already moved away from the real or fancy graffiti in the Coliseum. The color stains expressing the bloody dramas of heroic antiquity are no more exciting him. Color is limited to pencil lines competing with gray on large painted canvases.
Aged 41, the artist is certainly less sensitive to pornography and more to communication. His new style is comparable to a graffiti whose insignificant details form an opulent waterfall through the spontaneity of the artist's gesture .
One of his Untitled (Bolsena) 200 x 240 cm was sold for $ 15.4M including premium by Sotheby's on May 13, 2013. Another canvas of same size is estimated $ 35M for sale by Christie's in New York on May 13, lot 43B.
During the same stay in Bolsena, Twombly used the same format for exploring his variant of the white graffiti on black, started two years earlier. One such Untitled was sold for $ 6.2 million including premium by Phillips on 10 May 2012.
This research anticipates the outstanding series of blackboards made on the following year in New York and Rome, particularly disturbing by their false approach to writing and graphology. One of them, 156 x 190 cm, was sold for $ 70M including premium by Christie's on November 12, 2014.
Bolsena is in the former Latium but Twombly already moved away from the real or fancy graffiti in the Coliseum. The color stains expressing the bloody dramas of heroic antiquity are no more exciting him. Color is limited to pencil lines competing with gray on large painted canvases.
Aged 41, the artist is certainly less sensitive to pornography and more to communication. His new style is comparable to a graffiti whose insignificant details form an opulent waterfall through the spontaneity of the artist's gesture .
One of his Untitled (Bolsena) 200 x 240 cm was sold for $ 15.4M including premium by Sotheby's on May 13, 2013. Another canvas of same size is estimated $ 35M for sale by Christie's in New York on May 13, lot 43B.
During the same stay in Bolsena, Twombly used the same format for exploring his variant of the white graffiti on black, started two years earlier. One such Untitled was sold for $ 6.2 million including premium by Phillips on 10 May 2012.
This research anticipates the outstanding series of blackboards made on the following year in New York and Rome, particularly disturbing by their false approach to writing and graphology. One of them, 156 x 190 cm, was sold for $ 70M including premium by Christie's on November 12, 2014.
1969 Mousquetaire à la pipe by Picasso
2013 SOLD for $ 31M including premium by Sotheby's
Link to Artvalue.
1969 Incoming of Mosqueteros into Modern Art
2015 SOLD for $ 22.6M including premium
In 1966, Pablo Picasso is recovering. Despite his fragile health, the artist has kept his frenzy of creation, but his relationship to the world has changed. He no longer travels and is afraid of being jostled by a crowd.
His Musketeers are an offshoot of the masculinity that still excites the old man, but it is difficult to regard them as self-portraits. They are instead his companions of adventures. The temperament of the male transcends time: Picasso compares the soldiers from Rembrandt's time with the hippies of the sexual revolution.
The art of Picasso becomes a wink of complicity with youth. For the first time, his theme is decidedly humorous. The French boys, always fans of Alexandre Dumas, are delighted. They do not consider the dominant red and gold of these paintings that also mark the artist's refusal to return to Franco's Spain. Art critics are skeptical, except Zervos.
Pablo combines his own styles within that series as he has done since the early 1930s. A decidedly cubist Mousquetaire à la pipe, oil on canvas 195 x 130 cm painted on March 5, 1969, was sold for $ 31M including premium by Sotheby's on November 6, 2013 from a lower estimate of $ 12M.
L'Homme à l'épée, oil on canvas 146 x 114 cm painted on July 25, 1969 during the preparation of the Woodstock festival, is undoubtedly a hidalgo. He is a bodyguard of the old artist in his approach to the new world. The face that is only slightly deformed outside the aggressive gaze is perhaps a tribute to Velazquez. On the following year, Picasso approves the choice of this picture for the poster of the exhibition of his most recent art in Avignon.
L'Homme à l'épée was sold for £ 7M including premium by Sotheby's on June 24, 2009. It is for sale by Christie's in New York on November 9, lot 20A, with a minimum price guarantee which was not disclosed, as usual in such a case.
His Musketeers are an offshoot of the masculinity that still excites the old man, but it is difficult to regard them as self-portraits. They are instead his companions of adventures. The temperament of the male transcends time: Picasso compares the soldiers from Rembrandt's time with the hippies of the sexual revolution.
The art of Picasso becomes a wink of complicity with youth. For the first time, his theme is decidedly humorous. The French boys, always fans of Alexandre Dumas, are delighted. They do not consider the dominant red and gold of these paintings that also mark the artist's refusal to return to Franco's Spain. Art critics are skeptical, except Zervos.
Pablo combines his own styles within that series as he has done since the early 1930s. A decidedly cubist Mousquetaire à la pipe, oil on canvas 195 x 130 cm painted on March 5, 1969, was sold for $ 31M including premium by Sotheby's on November 6, 2013 from a lower estimate of $ 12M.
L'Homme à l'épée, oil on canvas 146 x 114 cm painted on July 25, 1969 during the preparation of the Woodstock festival, is undoubtedly a hidalgo. He is a bodyguard of the old artist in his approach to the new world. The face that is only slightly deformed outside the aggressive gaze is perhaps a tribute to Velazquez. On the following year, Picasso approves the choice of this picture for the poster of the exhibition of his most recent art in Avignon.
L'Homme à l'épée was sold for £ 7M including premium by Sotheby's on June 24, 2009. It is for sale by Christie's in New York on November 9, lot 20A, with a minimum price guarantee which was not disclosed, as usual in such a case.
1969 Rothko dissolved in his Light
2018 SOLD for $ 19M including premium
For Mark Rothko 1969 is a year of frenetic creation. His wife has just left him and his illness is getting worse. He has no other occupation than his art. Monitored by doctors he can no longer work in large formats, at least temporarily.
The most important American abstract artists, Pollock and Rothko, both appreciated that paper could offer a better final brightness than canvas. Certainly for reasons of fragility and of conservation of the paper, their career was however mostly done with canvases.
During this critical phase which will be in remission before the end of the year, Rothko focuses on the luminous properties of his colors on paper, generally not exceeding 40 inches. Most of these papers are mounted on canvas.
Rothko brings to this new phase his experience of two decades in the choice of pigments. Many of his works in this pathetic series have a dark texture that does not exclude a high radiance. Clear compositions are rarer and may reflect short lived phases of optimism.
The vibrating reds then have a dominant role, even when their surface is restricted to the edge and the interstices. A large red and yellow oil on paper 134 x 103 cm was sold for $ 11M including premium by Christie's on November 15, 2017.
An example in pearly white and orange of this quest for ultimate brightness is for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 16. The scarlet red is thin but contributes to the powerful balance. This oil on paper 99 x 65 cm mounted on canvas is estimated $ 7M, lot 5 in the sale of the Mandel collection. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The most important American abstract artists, Pollock and Rothko, both appreciated that paper could offer a better final brightness than canvas. Certainly for reasons of fragility and of conservation of the paper, their career was however mostly done with canvases.
During this critical phase which will be in remission before the end of the year, Rothko focuses on the luminous properties of his colors on paper, generally not exceeding 40 inches. Most of these papers are mounted on canvas.
Rothko brings to this new phase his experience of two decades in the choice of pigments. Many of his works in this pathetic series have a dark texture that does not exclude a high radiance. Clear compositions are rarer and may reflect short lived phases of optimism.
The vibrating reds then have a dominant role, even when their surface is restricted to the edge and the interstices. A large red and yellow oil on paper 134 x 103 cm was sold for $ 11M including premium by Christie's on November 15, 2017.
An example in pearly white and orange of this quest for ultimate brightness is for sale by Sotheby's in New York on May 16. The scarlet red is thin but contributes to the powerful balance. This oil on paper 99 x 65 cm mounted on canvas is estimated $ 7M, lot 5 in the sale of the Mandel collection. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
1969 The Sublime Landscape of Gerhard Richter
2015 SOLD for £ 15.8M including premium
From his beginnings in the 1960s with his recuperation of blurry photos, Gerhard Richter questioned the meaning of art in the society. In parallel, he perfected his technique of brushstrokes to create subtle color variations that will characterize the rest of his career.
In 1969, he already appears both as an excellent practitioner and as a theorist. Admirer of Friedrich, Richter appreciates that the romantic paintings of landscapes are timeless because the landscapes have no soul. The fact that the most beautiful natural sites are universally considered as sublime is a paradox that the perfection of his own art will unveil, or rather denounce.
In his library of images, Richter chooses Lake Lucerne (Vierwaldstätter See) in the violent backlighting of a cloudy day. All the elements converge for his purposed demonstration: the mountains in the shadow or in the fog, the variations of sky and water and the reflections on the lake.
The lines are blurred like the edges of Rothko's rectangles. Richter brings a sumptuous variation of shades by spreading a dry brush on the wet canvas, two decades before extending his use of the squeegee in abstract art.
His view of Lake Lucerne is supposed to compete altogether with nature and Turner. This oil on canvas 120 x 150 cm will be sold by Christie's in London on February 11, lot 8.
In 1969, he already appears both as an excellent practitioner and as a theorist. Admirer of Friedrich, Richter appreciates that the romantic paintings of landscapes are timeless because the landscapes have no soul. The fact that the most beautiful natural sites are universally considered as sublime is a paradox that the perfection of his own art will unveil, or rather denounce.
In his library of images, Richter chooses Lake Lucerne (Vierwaldstätter See) in the violent backlighting of a cloudy day. All the elements converge for his purposed demonstration: the mountains in the shadow or in the fog, the variations of sky and water and the reflections on the lake.
The lines are blurred like the edges of Rothko's rectangles. Richter brings a sumptuous variation of shades by spreading a dry brush on the wet canvas, two decades before extending his use of the squeegee in abstract art.
His view of Lake Lucerne is supposed to compete altogether with nature and Turner. This oil on canvas 120 x 150 cm will be sold by Christie's in London on February 11, lot 8.
1969 The Green Bearded Artist
2016 SOLD for $ 18.4M including premium
After more than one year in convalescence, Pablo Picasso takes his brushes again in February 1967. Aged 86, he is too old for being excited by women and his art enters a new phase. The theme of the Mousquetaires is funny and invites him to reinterpret in his own way the masters of the past.
L'Homme à la pipe painted on May 8, 1969 joins this movement with other features. He is not a mosquetero but an artist. The heavy beard and the hat in the style of a canotier even allows to identify an impressionist. The beard is green, providing a link between the pioneers of outdoor painting and the desire of a return to the land expressed by the new generations.
Young people are indeed restless at that time, with the protest movements of 1968 and the Woodstock festival in the following year. They are more appealed by this new style of Picasso than by Van Dyck or Velazquez. The images of Pablo are sharp, without those cubist distortions of the faces that were beginning to bother his own admirers.
L'Homme à la pipe is a larger than life oil on canvas 195 x 130 cm. It was sold for $ 11.8M including premium by Sotheby's on November 7, 2007. It is estimated $ 15M for sale by Christie's in New York on November 16, lot 26 B.
L'Homme à la pipe painted on May 8, 1969 joins this movement with other features. He is not a mosquetero but an artist. The heavy beard and the hat in the style of a canotier even allows to identify an impressionist. The beard is green, providing a link between the pioneers of outdoor painting and the desire of a return to the land expressed by the new generations.
Young people are indeed restless at that time, with the protest movements of 1968 and the Woodstock festival in the following year. They are more appealed by this new style of Picasso than by Van Dyck or Velazquez. The images of Pablo are sharp, without those cubist distortions of the faces that were beginning to bother his own admirers.
L'Homme à la pipe is a larger than life oil on canvas 195 x 130 cm. It was sold for $ 11.8M including premium by Sotheby's on November 7, 2007. It is estimated $ 15M for sale by Christie's in New York on November 16, lot 26 B.
1969 Blueberry by Joan Mitchell
2018 SOLD for $ 16.6M including premium by Christie's
Link to catalogue.
1969 A White Shirt from Italy
2015 SOLD for $ 6.9M including premium
1969 is the year of highest creativity for Domenico Gnoli, the young Italian artist who died from cancer in the following year. He expresses his relationship to the world by a huge magnification of details in clothing. Even when he deals with more personalized subjects such as the hair of his wife, his keeping of geometry in the figuration remains one of the highlights of his style.
His attraction to white is rare but perfectly follows one of the major trends of Italian modern art, after the achromatic folds by Manzoni, the lacerations by Fontana and the geometric patterns by Castellani.
Gnoli uses a technique of acrylic and sand that brings an effect of texture onto the canvas. On the other side of the Atlantic, artistic variations in the white are experienced by Robert Ryman.
Shirt collar size 14 1/2 displays an immaculate and neatly folded shirt with a light fringe of shadow and a geometry interrupted by the size label. Such use of hyperrealism in white is a feat of composition. This artwork 170 x 130 cm is estimated $ 7M, for sale by Phillips on May 13 in New York, lot 30.
His attraction to white is rare but perfectly follows one of the major trends of Italian modern art, after the achromatic folds by Manzoni, the lacerations by Fontana and the geometric patterns by Castellani.
Gnoli uses a technique of acrylic and sand that brings an effect of texture onto the canvas. On the other side of the Atlantic, artistic variations in the white are experienced by Robert Ryman.
Shirt collar size 14 1/2 displays an immaculate and neatly folded shirt with a light fringe of shadow and a geometry interrupted by the size label. Such use of hyperrealism in white is a feat of composition. This artwork 170 x 130 cm is estimated $ 7M, for sale by Phillips on May 13 in New York, lot 30.
1969 The Violence in the Feet of Kazuo Shiraga
2014 SOLD 3.9 M€ including premium
The abstract art by Kazuo Shiraga is looking for a total energy through a direct contact between the body of the artist and the canvas. The choice of bright colors further increases the violence.
His technique of painting with his feet by hanging onto a rope from the ceiling can transfer to the artwork the full power of instinct, with highly expressive turning movements. The varied colors attest to a gradual process like in Pollock's drippings.
This spectacular art is also an incentive to the happenings, that Shiraga loved practicing. His physical approach to painting is inspired by Japanese martial arts, but his art was also especially appreciated in Paris where it could be compared with the hyper-fast colored scars by Georges Mathieu.
Two of his oil paintings made twenty years apart are for sale in Paris in the coming days. Each of them is estimated € 1M.
Painted in 1969, Gekidou Suru Aka, 183 x 229 cm, is typical of these powerful energies that fans appreciate in the early career of Shiraga. It is for sale by Sotheby's on June 3, lot 4.
More complex in its relationships of colors despite a similar technique, Yagenko reminds the contrasts of the infernal compositions by Matta. Made in 1989, this 194 x 258 cm painting is for sale by Christie's on June 4, lot 28.
POST SALE COMMENTS
1
The 1969 painting discussed above is very important in the career of Shiraga : it had been made in the preparation of the Osaka World Exhibition. It was sold for € 3.9 million including premium by Sotheby's.
2
The 1989 painting was sold for € 1.02M including premium by Christie's.
His technique of painting with his feet by hanging onto a rope from the ceiling can transfer to the artwork the full power of instinct, with highly expressive turning movements. The varied colors attest to a gradual process like in Pollock's drippings.
This spectacular art is also an incentive to the happenings, that Shiraga loved practicing. His physical approach to painting is inspired by Japanese martial arts, but his art was also especially appreciated in Paris where it could be compared with the hyper-fast colored scars by Georges Mathieu.
Two of his oil paintings made twenty years apart are for sale in Paris in the coming days. Each of them is estimated € 1M.
Painted in 1969, Gekidou Suru Aka, 183 x 229 cm, is typical of these powerful energies that fans appreciate in the early career of Shiraga. It is for sale by Sotheby's on June 3, lot 4.
More complex in its relationships of colors despite a similar technique, Yagenko reminds the contrasts of the infernal compositions by Matta. Made in 1989, this 194 x 258 cm painting is for sale by Christie's on June 4, lot 28.
POST SALE COMMENTS
1
The 1969 painting discussed above is very important in the career of Shiraga : it had been made in the preparation of the Osaka World Exhibition. It was sold for € 3.9 million including premium by Sotheby's.
2
The 1989 painting was sold for € 1.02M including premium by Christie's.
1969 The Musical Feast of Marc Chagall
2010 SOLD 32 MHK$ including premium
Chagall never stopped painting his dream world. In 1969, he was a forever young man of 82 years, fascinated by the rhythm of life.
Bestiaire et Musique (Bestiary and Music), a large oil on canvas 140 x 155 cm, features a frantic dance of the usual characters of the mythology of the artist. Before the primordial couple of Marc and Bella, among a crowd of circus figures, the flutist is a donkey.
Dark and saturated colors are common in the art of Chagall at that time. They highlight the enormous chicken head that mystically dominates this carousel.
This painting is for sale on October 4 by Seoul Auction in Hong Kong.
Exactly one year ago, I had praised in my column the excellent initiative of this Korean auction house that comes to Hong Kong, third auction place of the world, to organize sales mixing modern art of West and East. Hirst's work that I then chose to comment was sold HK $ 15.5 million including premium.
POST SALE COMMENT
This painting by Chagall was both an outstanding work and the highlight of this cosmopolitan sale. It was sold HK $ 28.5 million before fees.
Bestiaire et Musique (Bestiary and Music), a large oil on canvas 140 x 155 cm, features a frantic dance of the usual characters of the mythology of the artist. Before the primordial couple of Marc and Bella, among a crowd of circus figures, the flutist is a donkey.
Dark and saturated colors are common in the art of Chagall at that time. They highlight the enormous chicken head that mystically dominates this carousel.
This painting is for sale on October 4 by Seoul Auction in Hong Kong.
Exactly one year ago, I had praised in my column the excellent initiative of this Korean auction house that comes to Hong Kong, third auction place of the world, to organize sales mixing modern art of West and East. Hirst's work that I then chose to comment was sold HK $ 15.5 million including premium.
POST SALE COMMENT
This painting by Chagall was both an outstanding work and the highlight of this cosmopolitan sale. It was sold HK $ 28.5 million before fees.
