1979
1979 the Monet by de Kooning
2022 SOLD for $ 35M by Sotheby's
In 1977 Willem de Kooning was busy to interpret in abstraction the scintillating colors of landscape, sea and sky around his home at East Hampton.
That creative activity was followed with a reduced output after he fell once again in 1978 in alcoholism and anxiety. The rarity of de Kooning's art in 1979 and 1980 attests of the sustained psychological difficulty of the artist then in his mid 70s. They have been made still scarcer by his practice to scrap his own work when it did not match his expectancies.
From their beginnings in the 1940s, de Kooning and Gorky used to deny the influence of previous art and their belonging to a trend or to school. They indeed expressed their own feelings.
An oil on canvas 178 x 200 cm painted ca 1979 is a turning point in de Kooning's creativity. He managed to transfer to abstraction the colors of water mirroring the sky in Monet's Nymphéas. Its balance of brilliant saturated dominant blue with yellow and their combined green. The technique is a mix of impasto applied and removed with the knife and of thinned paint in combinations of solvents, reflecting the rapid gesture and the energy of the arm.
This Untitled was dubbed 'the Monet' and treasured by his daughter and grandchildren. They said : It was a window, we had the sea in the studio. Directly from that provenance, it was sold for $ 35M by Sotheby's on November 16, 2022, lot 108. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
That creative activity was followed with a reduced output after he fell once again in 1978 in alcoholism and anxiety. The rarity of de Kooning's art in 1979 and 1980 attests of the sustained psychological difficulty of the artist then in his mid 70s. They have been made still scarcer by his practice to scrap his own work when it did not match his expectancies.
From their beginnings in the 1940s, de Kooning and Gorky used to deny the influence of previous art and their belonging to a trend or to school. They indeed expressed their own feelings.
An oil on canvas 178 x 200 cm painted ca 1979 is a turning point in de Kooning's creativity. He managed to transfer to abstraction the colors of water mirroring the sky in Monet's Nymphéas. Its balance of brilliant saturated dominant blue with yellow and their combined green. The technique is a mix of impasto applied and removed with the knife and of thinned paint in combinations of solvents, reflecting the rapid gesture and the energy of the arm.
This Untitled was dubbed 'the Monet' and treasured by his daughter and grandchildren. They said : It was a window, we had the sea in the studio. Directly from that provenance, it was sold for $ 35M by Sotheby's on November 16, 2022, lot 108. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
1979 BACON
1
Three Studies for Self Portrait
2022 SOLD for $ 29M by Christie's
Mortality is a thread line in the art of Francis Bacon. Early felt as a challenge, it became a personal tragedy after the untimely death of his love partners, Peter in 1962 and George in 1971. He painted no less than 29 self portraits in the 1970s. In 1979 the death of the club owner Muriel Belcher at 71 years old marks a termination of the feeling of good life in Soho.
Turning 70 in the same year, Francis feels of himself like a survivor, more than ever looking for the ravage of time on his own face.
This sad mood is reflected in a triptych again titled Three Studies for a Self Portrait painted in 1979, sold for $ 29M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 52.
These three faces bears marks of aging through patches of pink and blue over the pale flesh. The blazing orange background is a reminder of his first masterpiece in triptych, the 1944 Three studies of figures at the base of a crucifixion.
Turning 70 in the same year, Francis feels of himself like a survivor, more than ever looking for the ravage of time on his own face.
This sad mood is reflected in a triptych again titled Three Studies for a Self Portrait painted in 1979, sold for $ 29M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 52.
These three faces bears marks of aging through patches of pink and blue over the pale flesh. The blazing orange background is a reminder of his first masterpiece in triptych, the 1944 Three studies of figures at the base of a crucifixion.
2
Study for Self Portrait
2019 SOLD for $ 9M by Christie's
A self portrait was painted by Francis Bacon as a single picture in his signature 35 x 30 cm format mostly used for his head triptychs.
This image is poignant in his expression of his own aging and mortality, much more than the triptych from the same year which was sold for $ 29M by Christie's in 2022.
On a dark background that erases the jacket, Francis's face is easily recognizable with its round cheeks and strong jawline but it is rigged with deep crimson and red creases in the forehead. Such a desolation is possibly more of a projection into a damaged future than of a realistic view of the time. The effect is increased by the elusive and slightly strabismic downwards gaze.
This oil on canvas was sold for $ 9M by Christie's on November 13, 2019, lot 17 B.
This image is poignant in his expression of his own aging and mortality, much more than the triptych from the same year which was sold for $ 29M by Christie's in 2022.
On a dark background that erases the jacket, Francis's face is easily recognizable with its round cheeks and strong jawline but it is rigged with deep crimson and red creases in the forehead. Such a desolation is possibly more of a projection into a damaged future than of a realistic view of the time. The effect is increased by the elusive and slightly strabismic downwards gaze.
This oil on canvas was sold for $ 9M by Christie's on November 13, 2019, lot 17 B.
1979 The Twilight of the Painter
2017 SOLD for $ 12.6M including premium
Philip Guston had been one of the best painters of the abstract expressionism, displaying explosions of colors from the center of his canvases. Painted in 1958, To Fellini was sold for $ 26M including premium by Christie's on May 15, 2013.
Guston is however tormented by the question of the role of art. When he moves to Woodstock NY in 1967 he completely changes his approach to the detriment of his own career.
He no longer understands what is the purpose of juxtaposing bright colors. He will now show ordinary objects of his time in a drawing imitating cartoons with poor or lugubrious colors.
On May 17 in New York, Christie's sells Painter at night, oil on canvas 172 x 203 cm painted in 1979, lot 11 B estimated $ 8M. This artwork bearing symbols from his whole life appears as his artistic testament. Did this chain smoker feel that his health was threatened ? He died in the next year of a heart attack.
The unshaved artist with dirty hair turns his back on the viewer. In his dignity as a creator, he is not embarrassed to look like a tramp. He holds his brush and looks at the smoke of his cigarette. The scene is barely lit by a small lamp that symbolized the suicide of his father in his teenager's drawings. Framed in a television it is only a picture in the picture : once again art did not express a reality.
Misunderstood in his later career during his lifetime, Guston has become the forerunner of a movement which does not yet have a name seeking to express the existentialist difficulty and the brutality of current life.
Guston is however tormented by the question of the role of art. When he moves to Woodstock NY in 1967 he completely changes his approach to the detriment of his own career.
He no longer understands what is the purpose of juxtaposing bright colors. He will now show ordinary objects of his time in a drawing imitating cartoons with poor or lugubrious colors.
On May 17 in New York, Christie's sells Painter at night, oil on canvas 172 x 203 cm painted in 1979, lot 11 B estimated $ 8M. This artwork bearing symbols from his whole life appears as his artistic testament. Did this chain smoker feel that his health was threatened ? He died in the next year of a heart attack.
The unshaved artist with dirty hair turns his back on the viewer. In his dignity as a creator, he is not embarrassed to look like a tramp. He holds his brush and looks at the smoke of his cigarette. The scene is barely lit by a small lamp that symbolized the suicide of his father in his teenager's drawings. Framed in a television it is only a picture in the picture : once again art did not express a reality.
Misunderstood in his later career during his lifetime, Guston has become the forerunner of a movement which does not yet have a name seeking to express the existentialist difficulty and the brutality of current life.
JOHNS
1
1979 Cicada
2023 SOLD for $ 6.8M by Christie's
The Cicada series of three pictures of cross hatched figures is revealing the conception of Jasper Johns with that fully abstract themes. The hatched elements intersect together like a kaleidoscope so that the viewer cannot find an overlapping coherence of the whole composition. Hatchings are made at all angles from vertical to horizontal.
Some subtle coherences nevertheless exist as demonstrated by a 1978 sketch annotated by the artist. There is an absolute similarity of the sequence of colors between the left and right edges, and another one between the upper and lower edges. The three primary colors are reversed to the three secondary from center to edges of a fictive central vertical which displays the six colors.
Cicada may be a reference to the hatched patterns of the wings of that insect. It is instead considered as evoking the vibrations that produce its special buzz. Other possible titles that were not chosen included Locust and Husk.
A Cicada, oil on canvas 76 x 57 cm painted in 1979, was sold for $ 6.8M by Christie's on May 11, 2023, lot 12A.
Some subtle coherences nevertheless exist as demonstrated by a 1978 sketch annotated by the artist. There is an absolute similarity of the sequence of colors between the left and right edges, and another one between the upper and lower edges. The three primary colors are reversed to the three secondary from center to edges of a fictive central vertical which displays the six colors.
Cicada may be a reference to the hatched patterns of the wings of that insect. It is instead considered as evoking the vibrations that produce its special buzz. Other possible titles that were not chosen included Locust and Husk.
A Cicada, oil on canvas 76 x 57 cm painted in 1979, was sold for $ 6.8M by Christie's on May 11, 2023, lot 12A.
2
1979-1981 Usuyuki
2022 SOLD for $ 11.8M by Christie's
After his signature pseudo-figurative themes which were the US flag, the target, the map and the numbers, Jasper Johns added from 1972 the crosshatch in repetitive patterns. This technical figure was used by artists to display the shades in their prints.
Not so far from the op art, Johns's hatches are bringing a shimmering effect on a flat surface.
Some of them were titled Usuyuki, a Japanese word meaning light snow, probably inspired by his frequent stays and exhibitions in Tokyo.
The artist stated his deep interest for the lack of figurative meaning of the hatch. As usual the observers tried to find a secret code which probably never existed, in the follow of the search for patriotism in the US flags by the same artist.
A Usuyuki dated 1979-81 by the artist was sold for $ 11.8M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 57.
It is made of a triptych of oil on canvases assembled on an artist's frame 75 x 125 cm that provides a separation between the panels. Its icy blues and snowflake whites in oil are accompanied by passages in stormy gray charcoal plus traces of the warm colors of the rainbow. Single sized circles were added like footprints in the snow.
Not so far from the op art, Johns's hatches are bringing a shimmering effect on a flat surface.
Some of them were titled Usuyuki, a Japanese word meaning light snow, probably inspired by his frequent stays and exhibitions in Tokyo.
The artist stated his deep interest for the lack of figurative meaning of the hatch. As usual the observers tried to find a secret code which probably never existed, in the follow of the search for patriotism in the US flags by the same artist.
A Usuyuki dated 1979-81 by the artist was sold for $ 11.8M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 57.
It is made of a triptych of oil on canvases assembled on an artist's frame 75 x 125 cm that provides a separation between the panels. Its icy blues and snowflake whites in oil are accompanied by passages in stormy gray charcoal plus traces of the warm colors of the rainbow. Single sized circles were added like footprints in the snow.
1979 The Writing of the Universe
2018 SOLD for HK$ 70M including premium
Zao Wou-Ki appreciates in the 1970s that the universe is not limited to the fight of his inner passion. To continue to encompass everything from creation to unlimited expansion, he revisits the black inks of the Song and creates many wash paintings on paper.
Towards the end of the decade he enters a new phase by transposing his observations on ancient art to the oil on canvas. The shades of the wash subtly fill the light areas that bring the peace and the void that he had always psychologically missed. He chooses for the rest of his image vibrant colors in brushstrokes of great sharpness that he builds like a speedy writing.
The overall effect of 8.11.79 is a mountain range well centered between sky and lake. This painting 90 x 117 cm is small for this artist at that time. It was sold by Christie's on November 25, 2017 for HK $ 50M including premium over a lower estimate of HK $ 12M.
On May 27 in Hong Kong, Phillips sells as lot 5 a 250 x 260 cm oil on canvas painted in 1979, titled 4.1.79.
Composed in three parts like the other example above, this painting which looks from far away like a wash is an almost monochrome abstract mountain in a swirling surrounding of white mist. The closer inspection reveals the brightly colored lines and stains intermingled in the central part that brings to the whole its natural illusion.
Please watch the video shared by Phillips
Towards the end of the decade he enters a new phase by transposing his observations on ancient art to the oil on canvas. The shades of the wash subtly fill the light areas that bring the peace and the void that he had always psychologically missed. He chooses for the rest of his image vibrant colors in brushstrokes of great sharpness that he builds like a speedy writing.
The overall effect of 8.11.79 is a mountain range well centered between sky and lake. This painting 90 x 117 cm is small for this artist at that time. It was sold by Christie's on November 25, 2017 for HK $ 50M including premium over a lower estimate of HK $ 12M.
On May 27 in Hong Kong, Phillips sells as lot 5 a 250 x 260 cm oil on canvas painted in 1979, titled 4.1.79.
Composed in three parts like the other example above, this painting which looks from far away like a wash is an almost monochrome abstract mountain in a swirling surrounding of white mist. The closer inspection reveals the brightly colored lines and stains intermingled in the central part that brings to the whole its natural illusion.
Please watch the video shared by Phillips
1979 Moutons de Pierre by Lalanne
2011 SOLD for $ 7.5M by Christie's
An unusual idea can provide an overnight fame to an artist. In 1965, François-Xavier Lalanne creates a sensation in Paris at the Salon de la Jeune Peinture.
He designed a small bench in wood and aluminum, covered with wool, with four feet. All furniture manufacturers run their models in multiple copies: Lalanne standardizes the quantity to 24. Thus was born his flock of life size sheep, worthy of the best ideas of surrealism but in an extreme simplicity of interpretation.
The set is funny. The sheep with a proudly raised head is a bench with a hat holder and the headless sheep is an ottoman. This is a clear invitation to leave the pieces together : headless animals are considered occupied to graze within the group, protected by the external figures.
His first flock of 24 sheep is entitled Pour Polyphème. The artist's goal was to exhibit an innovative, utilitarian, monumental and modifiable work.
Throughout his career, Lalanne reissues his sheep. The first series, coated with real wool, are called the Moutons de Laine.
A flock made in 1968-1969 of five sheep and nine ottomans was sold for € 1.75M by Christie's on December 4, 2012, lot 22. A pair dated 1969 was sold for € 1.57M by Sotheby's on November 21, 2017, lot 38.
A complete herd of seven white sheep, one black sheep and sixteen ottomans was sold for $ 5.7M by Christie's on November 14, 2012, lot 43. This set had been purchased in 1976 by an American couple to fill a barn.
The success of the Moutons de Laine gives rise to new variants : the ram, the ewe, the lamb. The Mouton de Pierre appears in 1979 for use in the garden. It is in epoxy concrete and bronze, without wheels and without wool. It is first edited in 250 numbered units, later in small series of replicas.
A homogeneous group of ten Moutons de Pierre from the first edition was sold for $ 7.5M by Christie's on December 17, 2011, lot 303, from a lower estimate of $ 600K.
A group of ten was sold for $ 2.9M by Christie's on December 4, 2020, lot 608.
It is composed of one Bélier, three Moutons Transhumants, two Moutons de Pierre, two Brebis and two Agneaux, made between 1979 and 2004.
He designed a small bench in wood and aluminum, covered with wool, with four feet. All furniture manufacturers run their models in multiple copies: Lalanne standardizes the quantity to 24. Thus was born his flock of life size sheep, worthy of the best ideas of surrealism but in an extreme simplicity of interpretation.
The set is funny. The sheep with a proudly raised head is a bench with a hat holder and the headless sheep is an ottoman. This is a clear invitation to leave the pieces together : headless animals are considered occupied to graze within the group, protected by the external figures.
His first flock of 24 sheep is entitled Pour Polyphème. The artist's goal was to exhibit an innovative, utilitarian, monumental and modifiable work.
Throughout his career, Lalanne reissues his sheep. The first series, coated with real wool, are called the Moutons de Laine.
A flock made in 1968-1969 of five sheep and nine ottomans was sold for € 1.75M by Christie's on December 4, 2012, lot 22. A pair dated 1969 was sold for € 1.57M by Sotheby's on November 21, 2017, lot 38.
A complete herd of seven white sheep, one black sheep and sixteen ottomans was sold for $ 5.7M by Christie's on November 14, 2012, lot 43. This set had been purchased in 1976 by an American couple to fill a barn.
The success of the Moutons de Laine gives rise to new variants : the ram, the ewe, the lamb. The Mouton de Pierre appears in 1979 for use in the garden. It is in epoxy concrete and bronze, without wheels and without wool. It is first edited in 250 numbered units, later in small series of replicas.
A homogeneous group of ten Moutons de Pierre from the first edition was sold for $ 7.5M by Christie's on December 17, 2011, lot 303, from a lower estimate of $ 600K.
A group of ten was sold for $ 2.9M by Christie's on December 4, 2020, lot 608.
It is composed of one Bélier, three Moutons Transhumants, two Moutons de Pierre, two Brebis and two Agneaux, made between 1979 and 2004.
1979-1986 Nine Colored Marilyns Reversal by Warhol
2013 SOLD for $ 7.4M by Christie's
Anxious to confront his own face with death, Andy Warhol made in 1978 a small series of self portraits, inspired by the mortuary effect of a negative photograph.
A glowing example made of silkscreening gold ink on a black painted canvas 102 x 102 cm adds the kinetic effect of a triple view of his face in three angles superimposed from nearly full front to profile, applied in three separate screens from recent Polaroid self portraits. It was sold for $ 4.3M by Christie's on November 17, 2022, lot 69.
This series aesthetically anticipates the Reversal Marilyns, started in 1979, and the Reversal Electric Chairs of 1980.
The single image of Marilyn used by Warhol is for him a laboratory of the variation of the expression through the colors. Already in the 1967 portfolio of ten, he displays a full variety of emotions on the identical face of his icon.
In 1979 Warhol highlights again his Marilyn, reverting the tones over a black background like in a negative photo, providing a mortuary appearance. Most of the new Marilyns are painted in multicolored paint and silkscreen ink on canvas. Some of them have been completed by the artist in 1986.
A 1979-1986 138 x 106 cm 9 Colored Marilyns, in three rows of three figures including a variation of the colors, was sold for $ 7.4M by Christie's on May 7, 2013, lot 51.
Other examples may have slightly different colors.
Sotheby's sold a similar painting as the example above with same dates and size for £ 4.6M on June 30, 2014, lot 43 and for £ 5.2M on October 14, 2022, lot 116. Another painting of same dates and size was sold for £ 2.5M by Phillips de Pury on June 29, 2008, lot 225.
A glowing example made of silkscreening gold ink on a black painted canvas 102 x 102 cm adds the kinetic effect of a triple view of his face in three angles superimposed from nearly full front to profile, applied in three separate screens from recent Polaroid self portraits. It was sold for $ 4.3M by Christie's on November 17, 2022, lot 69.
This series aesthetically anticipates the Reversal Marilyns, started in 1979, and the Reversal Electric Chairs of 1980.
The single image of Marilyn used by Warhol is for him a laboratory of the variation of the expression through the colors. Already in the 1967 portfolio of ten, he displays a full variety of emotions on the identical face of his icon.
In 1979 Warhol highlights again his Marilyn, reverting the tones over a black background like in a negative photo, providing a mortuary appearance. Most of the new Marilyns are painted in multicolored paint and silkscreen ink on canvas. Some of them have been completed by the artist in 1986.
A 1979-1986 138 x 106 cm 9 Colored Marilyns, in three rows of three figures including a variation of the colors, was sold for $ 7.4M by Christie's on May 7, 2013, lot 51.
Other examples may have slightly different colors.
Sotheby's sold a similar painting as the example above with same dates and size for £ 4.6M on June 30, 2014, lot 43 and for £ 5.2M on October 14, 2022, lot 116. Another painting of same dates and size was sold for £ 2.5M by Phillips de Pury on June 29, 2008, lot 225.
1979 The Abstract Emotion of Richard Diebenkorn
2009 SOLD 6.5 M$ including premium
PRE SALE DISCUSSION
Much influenced by the work of Matisse, Richard Diebenkorn waved throughout his career between figuration and abstraction. Faithful to the Western United States, he was an active member of the Bay Area Figurative Movement, which again showed the landscape beyond abstraction. Starting from 1967, in the series of paintings Ocean Park, the beauty of California remains the main driver of his work, but the figure disappears again.
The creation of a painting by Diebenkorn was a long process during which the artist structured and restructured the image, with increasingly tenuous variations, until he considered that the effect matched the emotion he wanted to express.
Unlike other paintings of this series which are nearly monochromatic, Ocean Park 117, painted in 1979, is enhanced with bright colors, blue and yellow. Areas of flat colors, more and more narrow as we look towards the top of the canvas, can be a landscape or a river or a pool, or just the atmosphere of California.
At Christie's on May 13 in New York, this painting of average size for the artist, 114 x 114 cm, is estimated $ 4 million.
POST SALE COMMENT
Interesting and colorful, this painting has far exceeded the lower price that Christie's expected. It sold $ 6.5 million including premium. It can be considered as one of the most important examples of the Ocean Park series.
Much influenced by the work of Matisse, Richard Diebenkorn waved throughout his career between figuration and abstraction. Faithful to the Western United States, he was an active member of the Bay Area Figurative Movement, which again showed the landscape beyond abstraction. Starting from 1967, in the series of paintings Ocean Park, the beauty of California remains the main driver of his work, but the figure disappears again.
The creation of a painting by Diebenkorn was a long process during which the artist structured and restructured the image, with increasingly tenuous variations, until he considered that the effect matched the emotion he wanted to express.
Unlike other paintings of this series which are nearly monochromatic, Ocean Park 117, painted in 1979, is enhanced with bright colors, blue and yellow. Areas of flat colors, more and more narrow as we look towards the top of the canvas, can be a landscape or a river or a pool, or just the atmosphere of California.
At Christie's on May 13 in New York, this painting of average size for the artist, 114 x 114 cm, is estimated $ 4 million.
POST SALE COMMENT
Interesting and colorful, this painting has far exceeded the lower price that Christie's expected. It sold $ 6.5 million including premium. It can be considered as one of the most important examples of the Ocean Park series.
