1974
1974 Triptych 1974-77 by Bacon
2008 SOLD for £ 26.3M by Christie's
From March to June 1975, the solo exhibition of recent works by Francis Bacon at the Met was the first one after the traumatizing experience at the Grand Palais when George committed suicide in their hotel room.
In the mean time Francis made four tributes to his deceased lover in the large triptych format, three oils on canvas 198 x 148 cm each, which he only used for his achieved works. One of them, in oil, pastel and Letraset, was prepared for the Met. It was dated May-June 1974.
Each panel is centered on a nude male crouching figure, ready to enter the world of the dead. The central panel is an arena peeped from its wall by two flat monochrome Big Brother heads. On both side panels the same nude is featured on an open beach under a black umbrella. The left scene has two blurred figures far away. The beaches are otherwise deserted.
Originally the middle scene had a slug like bespectacled watcher in the foreground. In 1977 the artist preferred simplifying the message and removed that frivolous figure. From then the opus is designated as Triptych 1974-77. It was sold for £ 26.3M by Christie's on February 6, 2008, lot 35.
In the mean time Francis made four tributes to his deceased lover in the large triptych format, three oils on canvas 198 x 148 cm each, which he only used for his achieved works. One of them, in oil, pastel and Letraset, was prepared for the Met. It was dated May-June 1974.
Each panel is centered on a nude male crouching figure, ready to enter the world of the dead. The central panel is an arena peeped from its wall by two flat monochrome Big Brother heads. On both side panels the same nude is featured on an open beach under a black umbrella. The left scene has two blurred figures far away. The beaches are otherwise deserted.
Originally the middle scene had a slug like bespectacled watcher in the foreground. In 1977 the artist preferred simplifying the message and removed that frivolous figure. From then the opus is designated as Triptych 1974-77. It was sold for £ 26.3M by Christie's on February 6, 2008, lot 35.
1974 Mao's Birthplace by Li Keran
2017 SOLD for RMB 178M by Poly
Around 1964 the art of Li Keran is an exalted praise of Maoism. Troops of the Revolution cross the steep mountains of the Long March to reach the unlimited tranquility of the hills. There is no possible misinterpretation : a poem by Mao accompanies each image and the mountains are bright red.
Yet two years later the denunciation of outdated old customs is implacable : the Cultural Revolution does not spare Li Keran. Released after six years, he may resume his brushes provided he complies with the requirements of official art, including monumental paintings of high places of Maoism for official buildings and for diplomatic gifts.
In 1974 Li Keran painted a view of Mao's birthplace, a farmhouse in the Hunan hills where the Red Guards practiced pilgrimages far away from cities and conflicts to immerse themselves within the thought of the Great Helmsman long before the current craze for red tourism.
The farmhouse is shown in a photographic realism. The composition of the landscape in full format is decidedly modern but small groups with various occupations meet the tradition of Chinese handscroll imaging. Nearly one hundred characters in green uniform constitute these groups, approaching or moving away, sitting on the ground around a teacher or posing for a photo. Red flags are everywhere. As if the poem was not enough to applaud the modern mood of the regime, two electric pylons are standing in the distant countryside.
This ink and colors 142 x 243 cm was sold for RMB 124M including premium by China Guardian on May 12, 2012. It is now for sale by Poly in Beijing on December 17, lot 2661. It is illustrated in the 2017 post sale release by The Value.
Yet two years later the denunciation of outdated old customs is implacable : the Cultural Revolution does not spare Li Keran. Released after six years, he may resume his brushes provided he complies with the requirements of official art, including monumental paintings of high places of Maoism for official buildings and for diplomatic gifts.
In 1974 Li Keran painted a view of Mao's birthplace, a farmhouse in the Hunan hills where the Red Guards practiced pilgrimages far away from cities and conflicts to immerse themselves within the thought of the Great Helmsman long before the current craze for red tourism.
The farmhouse is shown in a photographic realism. The composition of the landscape in full format is decidedly modern but small groups with various occupations meet the tradition of Chinese handscroll imaging. Nearly one hundred characters in green uniform constitute these groups, approaching or moving away, sitting on the ground around a teacher or posing for a photo. Red flags are everywhere. As if the poem was not enough to applaud the modern mood of the regime, two electric pylons are standing in the distant countryside.
This ink and colors 142 x 243 cm was sold for RMB 124M including premium by China Guardian on May 12, 2012. It is now for sale by Poly in Beijing on December 17, lot 2661. It is illustrated in the 2017 post sale release by The Value.
1974 Three Studies for Self Portrait by Bacon
2011 SOLD for $ 25.3M by Christie's
Since his beginnings in 1944, Francis Bacon emphasizes the triptych, enabling him to express in a single work the variants of incommunicability. In the life size head portrait format, these oils on canvas, designated as Studies by the artist, have a unique individual dimension, 35 x 30 cm. An early example is the 1964 portrait of Lucian Freud sold for £ 23M by Sotheby's in 2011.
After George's death, Francis Bacon wanders, psychologically and physically. His London friends are also aging, and he is looking for new acquaintances in the intellectual circles of Paris. John Deakin had died in 1972 and he is no more supplied with photographs of their Soho friends. He looks in his mirror for lack of a better source of inspiration. Over the years, he sees therein a kind of portrait of Dorian Gray : the true image of himself.
Morbid, disgusted, ever looking for the meaning of life, watching death at work in his own mirror, the artist comes again to one of his preferred subjects : himself. The distortion of the face lines and the violence of the colors do not remove the likeness of these self-portraits, but with the nose of an old alcoholic.
Taking as a model some images made in a photo boost, the artist manages through such triple pictures a motion reminiscent of Muybridge and also a sort of sequence of police shots and possibly the illusion of a tridimensional effect.
Made in 1974, the face of Bacon in triptych sold for $ 25.3M by Christie's on May 11, 2011, lot 36, has a revealing feature : he cannot look at himself because his eyes are shut.
After George's death, Francis Bacon wanders, psychologically and physically. His London friends are also aging, and he is looking for new acquaintances in the intellectual circles of Paris. John Deakin had died in 1972 and he is no more supplied with photographs of their Soho friends. He looks in his mirror for lack of a better source of inspiration. Over the years, he sees therein a kind of portrait of Dorian Gray : the true image of himself.
Morbid, disgusted, ever looking for the meaning of life, watching death at work in his own mirror, the artist comes again to one of his preferred subjects : himself. The distortion of the face lines and the violence of the colors do not remove the likeness of these self-portraits, but with the nose of an old alcoholic.
Taking as a model some images made in a photo boost, the artist manages through such triple pictures a motion reminiscent of Muybridge and also a sort of sequence of police shots and possibly the illusion of a tridimensional effect.
Made in 1974, the face of Bacon in triptych sold for $ 25.3M by Christie's on May 11, 2011, lot 36, has a revealing feature : he cannot look at himself because his eyes are shut.
1974 Farbtafel by RICHTER
1
1025 Farben
2018 SOLD for £ 7.4M by Sotheby's
In 1966 Gerhard Richter is occupied with the anti-art. For the figurative he copies his blurry photos. This is not enough for his pictorial revolution : he now manages to remove aesthetics and representational from the abstract art in a full departure from the Bauhaus and the abstract expressionists.
To free the abstraction of all emotion he imitates the color charts of the industrial paint brands, without any fancy in the geometric composition. The carefully aligned rectangles or squares are separated by a narrow white grid. The arbitrary arrangement is described by the artist as "artificial naturalism".
He begins the year 1973 with gray monochromes and then tries real abstract dialogues between red, yellow and blue. At the turn of 1974 he devotes himself again to his Farbtafeln in lacquer on canvas. A large number of different colors is obtained by mixing the pigments with hues of gray.
The opus 357-2 painted in 1974, 121 x 124 cm with 1,025 colors was sold by Sotheby's for £ 7.4M on March 7, 2018, lot 8.
To free the abstraction of all emotion he imitates the color charts of the industrial paint brands, without any fancy in the geometric composition. The carefully aligned rectangles or squares are separated by a narrow white grid. The arbitrary arrangement is described by the artist as "artificial naturalism".
He begins the year 1973 with gray monochromes and then tries real abstract dialogues between red, yellow and blue. At the turn of 1974 he devotes himself again to his Farbtafeln in lacquer on canvas. A large number of different colors is obtained by mixing the pigments with hues of gray.
The opus 357-2 painted in 1974, 121 x 124 cm with 1,025 colors was sold by Sotheby's for £ 7.4M on March 7, 2018, lot 8.
2
4096 Farben
2023 SOLD for $ 22M by Sotheby's
Gerhard Richter appreciated that around 1,000 colors reached the limit of discrimination of the human eye. His preferred number was 1,024 as a factorial of 4.
The lower extreme is the opus 353-1 20 x 20 cm with 4 colors which is also the first in a mosaic juxtaposition without the separating grid.
The culmination of the 1974 Farbtafel series has each color applied four times in random positions for a total of 4,096 color fields. This lacquer of canvas 254 x 254 cm (100 x 100 inches) opus 359 was sold for $ 22M by Sotheby's on May 18, 2023, lot 112. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
Another culmination is nevertheless achieved in 2007 with the opus 901, 196 lacquered aluminum panels of 25 squares each that form when they are all assembled together a square of 680 x 680 cm and 4,900 colors in an interesting example of art adjustable by the user. In the same year the Kölner Domfenster is made of 11,500 squares of glass in 72 different colors.
The lower extreme is the opus 353-1 20 x 20 cm with 4 colors which is also the first in a mosaic juxtaposition without the separating grid.
The culmination of the 1974 Farbtafel series has each color applied four times in random positions for a total of 4,096 color fields. This lacquer of canvas 254 x 254 cm (100 x 100 inches) opus 359 was sold for $ 22M by Sotheby's on May 18, 2023, lot 112. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
Another culmination is nevertheless achieved in 2007 with the opus 901, 196 lacquered aluminum panels of 25 squares each that form when they are all assembled together a square of 680 x 680 cm and 4,900 colors in an interesting example of art adjustable by the user. In the same year the Kölner Domfenster is made of 11,500 squares of glass in 72 different colors.
1974 # 44 by Agnes Martin
2021 SOLD for $ 17.7M by Sotheby's
Agnes Martin expressed and disclosed in her art the perfect tranquility of nature. She shared with her audience her deep impregnation within Zen and Taoism. To achieve such a level of spirituality, her painting is devoid of form, space and time.
In the opposite, her life is a poignant fleeing from madness. She is subject to auditory hallucinations and catatonic trances and a paranoid schizophrenia has been diagnosed. In the big city, she forgets who and where she is, accepts exhibitions but rejects fame and catalogs. She once said that she is not a woman. It seems that her illness was aggravated by a frustrated homosexuality that she never confessed.
She decides in 1967 to go to the West. In her case, it is the best therapy. She lives alone without being actually isolated but refuses any help. In her wanderings in the desert she builds her own shelter huts. Old age will help Agnes to retrieve some social life but she deliberately ignores some usual aspects of it. She had never read a newspaper again.
She restarted painting in Taos in 1974. From then her penciled lattices are replaced by bands of pale color. The artist's personal touch in the painting is maintained by her hand guided by a mere straight edge without a masking tape.
Untitled # 44, acrylic and pencil on canvas 183 x 183 cm painted in 1974, was sold for $ 17.7M from a lower estimate of $ 6M by Sotheby's on November 15, 2021, lot 6. It is a highly rare example with a vertical central ivory line that may reminds the structural zips of Barnett Newman. The parallel bands are painted in pale blue and crimson lined with ivory that bring an exceptional luminescence.
In the spirit of Rothko the 72 x 72 inch monumental format was selected so that the viewer can enter into the art work.
In the opposite, her life is a poignant fleeing from madness. She is subject to auditory hallucinations and catatonic trances and a paranoid schizophrenia has been diagnosed. In the big city, she forgets who and where she is, accepts exhibitions but rejects fame and catalogs. She once said that she is not a woman. It seems that her illness was aggravated by a frustrated homosexuality that she never confessed.
She decides in 1967 to go to the West. In her case, it is the best therapy. She lives alone without being actually isolated but refuses any help. In her wanderings in the desert she builds her own shelter huts. Old age will help Agnes to retrieve some social life but she deliberately ignores some usual aspects of it. She had never read a newspaper again.
She restarted painting in Taos in 1974. From then her penciled lattices are replaced by bands of pale color. The artist's personal touch in the painting is maintained by her hand guided by a mere straight edge without a masking tape.
Untitled # 44, acrylic and pencil on canvas 183 x 183 cm painted in 1974, was sold for $ 17.7M from a lower estimate of $ 6M by Sotheby's on November 15, 2021, lot 6. It is a highly rare example with a vertical central ivory line that may reminds the structural zips of Barnett Newman. The parallel bands are painted in pale blue and crimson lined with ivory that bring an exceptional luminescence.
In the spirit of Rothko the 72 x 72 inch monumental format was selected so that the viewer can enter into the art work.
1974 Lotus Flowers by Wu Guanzhong
2019 SOLD for HK$ 130M by Sotheby's
In 1973 Wu Guanzhong is at last authorized after a six year ban to resume his work in Beijing, where he executes a series of lotus paintings and drawings in the Purple Bamboo Park.
Lotus Flowers, oil on canvas 61 x 50 cm, is a large size opus for that first year. It was sold for HK $ 34.4M by Sotheby's on April 4, 2015, lot 1009.
In 1974 a larger opus is numbered Lotus Flowers (I). The central bud is here superseded by a glorious full blossom, surrounded by plants in buds at lower heights. This oil on canvas 120 x 90 cm was sold for HK $ 130M from a lower estimate of HK $ 15M by Sotheby's on March 31, 2019, lot 1008.
The difference in self assurance between the 1973 and 1974 may be explained by the successful commission executed in the mean time for preparing a mural landscape of the Yangzi river.
Lotus Flowers, oil on canvas 61 x 50 cm, is a large size opus for that first year. It was sold for HK $ 34.4M by Sotheby's on April 4, 2015, lot 1009.
In 1974 a larger opus is numbered Lotus Flowers (I). The central bud is here superseded by a glorious full blossom, surrounded by plants in buds at lower heights. This oil on canvas 120 x 90 cm was sold for HK $ 130M from a lower estimate of HK $ 15M by Sotheby's on March 31, 2019, lot 1008.
The difference in self assurance between the 1973 and 1974 may be explained by the successful commission executed in the mean time for preparing a mural landscape of the Yangzi river.
1974 Elegy for the Spanish Republic by Motherwell
2019 SOLD for $ 10.3M by Sotheby's
In 1948 Robert Motherwell illustrates with a black ink drawing a poem by Harold Rosenberg titled Elegy to the Spanish Republic. On the white background, bulky ovoid elements are stuck at mid-height in a pattern of vertical columns. The masses of white and black display the balance of forces between life and death, or between order and chaos.
The Spanish Civil War was a triumph of death, illustrated by Picasso's Guernica. Motherwell begins to paint in an invariant overall style a very long series of Elegies to the Spanish Republic. The biomorphic forms between the columns look like compressed human heads between the bars of a prison. Escape is impossible. The pictures vary in the disposition of the black elements, in the colors of the background and in the size.
In the same stifling and dismal style, he had also painted in 1949 At Five in the Afternoon, inspired by writings on bullfighting by Garcia Lorca and Hemingway. A remake 229 x 305 cm painted in 1971 was sold for $ 12.7M by Phillips on May 17, 2018.
A limited series of Elegy paintings, numbered from 128 to 134, have a monumental size, 245 x 305 cm (96 x 120 inches). The No. 134, acrylic and charcoal on canvas 245 x 305 cm painted in 1974, was sold for $ 10.3M by Sotheby's on May 16, 2019, lot 35. It still expresses an obstructed hope. The background is blank.
The No. 130, acrylic on canvas 245 x 305 cm painted in 1974-1975, was sold for $ 4.7M by Sotheby's on May 16, 2023, lot 140. Struggling with Parkinson's disease, the old caudillo had resigned in 1973 his office as prime minister, but was still keeping for himself the offices of head of state and chief of the Falange. The oval form on the left in No. 130 is slightly eroded and the background is colored.
The arch-enemy of the Spanish Republic dies in 1975. His regime will not survive and Motherwell's lamentation is outdated. In 1978 on an order from the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC, Motherwell paints the gigantic Reconciliation Elegy, 305 x 924 cm. A space between two columns has exploded and the left edge is empty, in a new hope for a free world.
Dated 1976 but probably completed in 1979, the Elegy Study No. XIII, 61 x 122 cm, lets freedom flowing through the right edge. It was sold for $ 2.9M by Sotheby's in the same 2019 sale as above, lot 14.
The Spanish Civil War was a triumph of death, illustrated by Picasso's Guernica. Motherwell begins to paint in an invariant overall style a very long series of Elegies to the Spanish Republic. The biomorphic forms between the columns look like compressed human heads between the bars of a prison. Escape is impossible. The pictures vary in the disposition of the black elements, in the colors of the background and in the size.
In the same stifling and dismal style, he had also painted in 1949 At Five in the Afternoon, inspired by writings on bullfighting by Garcia Lorca and Hemingway. A remake 229 x 305 cm painted in 1971 was sold for $ 12.7M by Phillips on May 17, 2018.
A limited series of Elegy paintings, numbered from 128 to 134, have a monumental size, 245 x 305 cm (96 x 120 inches). The No. 134, acrylic and charcoal on canvas 245 x 305 cm painted in 1974, was sold for $ 10.3M by Sotheby's on May 16, 2019, lot 35. It still expresses an obstructed hope. The background is blank.
The No. 130, acrylic on canvas 245 x 305 cm painted in 1974-1975, was sold for $ 4.7M by Sotheby's on May 16, 2023, lot 140. Struggling with Parkinson's disease, the old caudillo had resigned in 1973 his office as prime minister, but was still keeping for himself the offices of head of state and chief of the Falange. The oval form on the left in No. 130 is slightly eroded and the background is colored.
The arch-enemy of the Spanish Republic dies in 1975. His regime will not survive and Motherwell's lamentation is outdated. In 1978 on an order from the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC, Motherwell paints the gigantic Reconciliation Elegy, 305 x 924 cm. A space between two columns has exploded and the left edge is empty, in a new hope for a free world.
Dated 1976 but probably completed in 1979, the Elegy Study No. XIII, 61 x 122 cm, lets freedom flowing through the right edge. It was sold for $ 2.9M by Sotheby's in the same 2019 sale as above, lot 14.
1974 Gala by Riley
2022 SOLD for £ 4.4M by Christie's
Influenced by pointillism and by Vasarely, Bridget Riley initially specialized in visual illusions in black and white. In the 1970s, she added color.
Inspecting the unlimited pattern on the large size image provides a mesmerizing illusion of instability of which it is hard to part.
Gala is an acrylic on canvas 160 x 160 cm painted in 1974. The sinuous lines are tight and equidistant, except against oblique stripes were they tighten even more. We see unstoppable rolling waves or a corrugated iron. The colors look mingled : the simple red, blue and green lines create an additional sensation of orange and pink.
It was sold for £ 4.4M from a lower estimate of £ 2.5M by Christie's on March 22, 2022, lot 10.
Inspecting the unlimited pattern on the large size image provides a mesmerizing illusion of instability of which it is hard to part.
Gala is an acrylic on canvas 160 x 160 cm painted in 1974. The sinuous lines are tight and equidistant, except against oblique stripes were they tighten even more. We see unstoppable rolling waves or a corrugated iron. The colors look mingled : the simple red, blue and green lines create an additional sensation of orange and pink.
It was sold for £ 4.4M from a lower estimate of £ 2.5M by Christie's on March 22, 2022, lot 10.
1974 Large Torso by de Kooning
2009 SOLD for $ 5.7M by Sotheby's
Made from a clay model and cast in 1974, two years after Clamdigger, the Large Torso taking the form of a sculpture from the Renaissance is an exception in the art of de Kooning. Nevertheless the details are abstract. For this artwork, the artist used gloves for a bolder 'action' gesture. Its size is 86 x 82 x 64 cm.
The bronze 6/7 cast by the Modern Art Foundry New York was sold for $ 5.7M from a lower estimate of $ 4M by Sotheby's on November 11, 2009, lot 14.
The bronze 6/7 cast by the Modern Art Foundry New York was sold for $ 5.7M from a lower estimate of $ 4M by Sotheby's on November 11, 2009, lot 14.
