Man and Woman
Except otherwise stated, all results include the premium.
See also : Women artists Self portrait Self portrait II Caillebotte Lichtenstein Picasso in Mougins Germany II Russia and Eastern Europe Chagall Northern Europe Central and South Americas Mexico Sculpture by painters
Chronology : 1881 1904 1920-1929 1928 1940-1949 1949 1953 1967 1980
See also : Women artists Self portrait Self portrait II Caillebotte Lichtenstein Picasso in Mougins Germany II Russia and Eastern Europe Chagall Northern Europe Central and South Americas Mexico Sculpture by painters
Chronology : 1881 1904 1920-1929 1928 1940-1949 1949 1953 1967 1980
masterpiece
1634 the Soolmans-Coppit portraits
joined ownership of Louvre and Rijksmuseum
Over a decade ago, these two #Rembrandt portraits made headlines when the #Rothschild family offered to sell them to the Louvre. When their price was too high, a more interesting solution was found…
— Barnebys.co.uk (@Barnebysuk) March 21, 2024
masterpiece
1857-1859 L'Angélus by Millet
Musée d'Orsay
From 1933 Dali, researching how virtue hides vice and shame, tries Freudian interpretations of the Angélus.
Dali remained obsessed with the Angélus, to which he devoted in 1963 an entire book titled Le Mythe tragique de l'Angélus de Millet. Le Louvre took an x-ray of the painting. The woman's gaze is directed towards a basket which peacefully symbolizes the harvest. In this place the original painting, masked by a repaint made by Millet, showed a child's coffin. Dali's intuition was confirmed, demonstrating the correctness of his paranoiac-critical hypersensitivity in this specific case.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
Dali remained obsessed with the Angélus, to which he devoted in 1963 an entire book titled Le Mythe tragique de l'Angélus de Millet. Le Louvre took an x-ray of the painting. The woman's gaze is directed towards a basket which peacefully symbolizes the harvest. In this place the original painting, masked by a repaint made by Millet, showed a child's coffin. Dali's intuition was confirmed, demonstrating the correctness of his paranoiac-critical hypersensitivity in this specific case.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
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masterpiece
1875-1876 Dans un Café (L'Absinthe) by Degas
Musée d'Orsay
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
masterpiece
1877 Les Foins by Bastien-Lepage
Musée d'Orsay
This rustic scene triggered in 1980 the post-Maoist humanistic art by Chen Danqing.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
1881 Chemin Montant by Caillebotte
2019 SOLD for £ 16.7M by Christie's
Martial Caillebotte was a cloth merchant who had amassed a considerable fortune as a supplier of the armies of Napoléon III. His sons did not need to work for living.
Gustave Caillebotte enjoyed rowing, sailing, painting, gardening. In 1875 a painting showing workmen is refused by the Salon : the subject cannot please the bourgeois. In response, the young artist undertakes to support the Impressionnistes. He will even be an indefectible guarantor of a certain authenticity of the early impressionist style.
Gustave is skilled. The sharp line from his beginnings gives way to a real impressionist brushstroke. In bold compositions, he studies the effects of diving and counter-diving.
He spends several summers near Trouville, the seaside village that offers its nautical pleasures and social entertainment to wealthy Parisians housed in grands hôtels and opulent villas.
Chemin montant, oil on canvas 100 x 125 cm painted in 1881, was sold by Christie's for $ 6.7M on November 4, 2003 and for £ 16.7M on February 27, 2019, lot 28. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
A man and a woman are seen from behind, at the edge between the shadow and a bright summer sun. They move slowly, at the same level, without worrying about each other. They are not recognizable, probably to protect the anonymity of the very young woman who will henceforth share the life of the artist. The connoisseurs of the ancient Trouville recognize on the left side the Villa Italienne which was bordered by a steep path.
The artwork is painted in the full Impressionniste maturity of Caillebotte, probably in his studio from sketches. The path is leveled for a better opening onto the wooded horizon. The color balance is carefully constructed, with the yellow of the hat and the blue of gown and sky echoing the green of the vegetation while being embellished with the red-orange spots of the shutters and the sunshade.
Gustave Caillebotte enjoyed rowing, sailing, painting, gardening. In 1875 a painting showing workmen is refused by the Salon : the subject cannot please the bourgeois. In response, the young artist undertakes to support the Impressionnistes. He will even be an indefectible guarantor of a certain authenticity of the early impressionist style.
Gustave is skilled. The sharp line from his beginnings gives way to a real impressionist brushstroke. In bold compositions, he studies the effects of diving and counter-diving.
He spends several summers near Trouville, the seaside village that offers its nautical pleasures and social entertainment to wealthy Parisians housed in grands hôtels and opulent villas.
Chemin montant, oil on canvas 100 x 125 cm painted in 1881, was sold by Christie's for $ 6.7M on November 4, 2003 and for £ 16.7M on February 27, 2019, lot 28. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
A man and a woman are seen from behind, at the edge between the shadow and a bright summer sun. They move slowly, at the same level, without worrying about each other. They are not recognizable, probably to protect the anonymity of the very young woman who will henceforth share the life of the artist. The connoisseurs of the ancient Trouville recognize on the left side the Villa Italienne which was bordered by a steep path.
The artwork is painted in the full Impressionniste maturity of Caillebotte, probably in his studio from sketches. The path is leveled for a better opening onto the wooded horizon. The color balance is carefully constructed, with the yellow of the hat and the blue of gown and sky echoing the green of the vegetation while being embellished with the red-orange spots of the shutters and the sunshade.
1894 Vampire by Munch
2008 SOLD for $ 38M by Sotheby's
Munch knew to mingle love and death as exampled by his Madonna. He was an illustrator concerned about the disclosure of his work, who made his oils on canvas in a small number of examples and added lithographic issues with a virtually identical drawing. As a result, this female "vampire", with her flame-color long hair, kissing on the neck of her lover, is an image that the auction news bring us often.
The Vampire was painted in four copies in 1893-1894. The only oil on canvas in private handshad been loaned during ten years to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was sold for $ 38M by Sotheby's on November 3, 2008. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
The Vampire was painted in four copies in 1893-1894. The only oil on canvas in private handshad been loaned during ten years to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was sold for $ 38M by Sotheby's on November 3, 2008. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
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masterpiece
1908 Liebespaar (The Kiss) by Klimt
Belvedere, Vienna
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
1928 Les Amoureux by Chagall
2017 SOLD for $ 28.5M by Sotheby's
Marc and Bella Chagall are charming in their total empathy for one another. On November 14, 2017, Sotheby's sold for $ 28.5M from a lower estimate of $ 12M Les Amoureux, oil on canvas 117 x 90 cm painted by Marc in 1928, lot 8.
The theme of lovers portraying his own couple is recurrent in the art of Chagall but this work is especially touching by the attitudes, the realism of the very recognizable faces and some discretion of the surrealist attributes.
In their beatitude the lovers are floating. The young man with closed eyes is resting his head between the cheek and the shoulder of the woman. She gently welcomes this enthusiastic impulse but her eyes wide open indicate the lucidity with which she guides in real life this innocent husband.
Paris is their nest. In that same year Marc painted Les Mariés de la Tour Eiffel where their dear little Ida is disguised as a floating angel to present the bouquet. This oil on canvas 90 x 117 cm was sold for £ 7M by Christie's on February 2, 2016.
Let's go back to our Amoureux. Marc does not miss to express his gratitude to his host country. The tricolor dress of Bella ends with a blue in which is transposed the sky centered by a dazzling sun. In this sky a tiny bird comes to offer its auspices to the embraced couple. Leaves and flowers bring their frame to this ethereal scene.
Please watch the video shared by Sotheby's in which the love of Marc and Bella is commented by one of their granddaughters.
The theme of lovers portraying his own couple is recurrent in the art of Chagall but this work is especially touching by the attitudes, the realism of the very recognizable faces and some discretion of the surrealist attributes.
In their beatitude the lovers are floating. The young man with closed eyes is resting his head between the cheek and the shoulder of the woman. She gently welcomes this enthusiastic impulse but her eyes wide open indicate the lucidity with which she guides in real life this innocent husband.
Paris is their nest. In that same year Marc painted Les Mariés de la Tour Eiffel where their dear little Ida is disguised as a floating angel to present the bouquet. This oil on canvas 90 x 117 cm was sold for £ 7M by Christie's on February 2, 2016.
Let's go back to our Amoureux. Marc does not miss to express his gratitude to his host country. The tricolor dress of Bella ends with a blue in which is transposed the sky centered by a dazzling sun. In this sky a tiny bird comes to offer its auspices to the embraced couple. Leaves and flowers bring their frame to this ethereal scene.
Please watch the video shared by Sotheby's in which the love of Marc and Bella is commented by one of their granddaughters.
1949 Diego y yo by Kahlo
2021 SOLD for $ 35M by Sotheby's
Frida Kahlo suffered a lifelong intense pain in her back after an accident. She courageously faced her condition by her art and by her quest for a passion out of the ordinary, including political commitment and bisexuality. She found her partner, unfaithful husband and accomplice in the Communist artist Diego Rivera, 20 years older than her.
Kahlo's art is made of metaphors and symbols with a high poetry. A friend of the Surrealists, she nevertheless insisted to state that she was not representing her dreams but her reality. 55 of her ca 143 paintings are self portraits.
Eager to exchange an empathy, she often made and inscribed self portraits for friends : Trotsky, her doctors. On November 16, 2021, Sotheby's sold such a self portrait for $ 35M, lot 12. This oil on masonite 30 x 22 cm painted in 1949 is dedicated to Florence and Sam, a couple of friends who were instrumental in promoting her art. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The piece was titled Diego y yo by the artist. It displays the portrait in bust of Diego Rivera on the forehead, fully centered between eyebrows and hair. This figure has at the same place the third eye of wisdom. The intimate theme of this self portrait is indeed her obsession for Diego. Three tears flow on her cheeks.
A self portrait executed in 1954, the year of her untimely death, is in the same inspiration, with the image of Diego on the breast and of her rival Maria between the eyebrows.
Kahlo's art is made of metaphors and symbols with a high poetry. A friend of the Surrealists, she nevertheless insisted to state that she was not representing her dreams but her reality. 55 of her ca 143 paintings are self portraits.
Eager to exchange an empathy, she often made and inscribed self portraits for friends : Trotsky, her doctors. On November 16, 2021, Sotheby's sold such a self portrait for $ 35M, lot 12. This oil on masonite 30 x 22 cm painted in 1949 is dedicated to Florence and Sam, a couple of friends who were instrumental in promoting her art. Please watch the video shared by the auction house.
The piece was titled Diego y yo by the artist. It displays the portrait in bust of Diego Rivera on the forehead, fully centered between eyebrows and hair. This figure has at the same place the third eye of wisdom. The intimate theme of this self portrait is indeed her obsession for Diego. Three tears flow on her cheeks.
A self portrait executed in 1954, the year of her untimely death, is in the same inspiration, with the image of Diego on the breast and of her rival Maria between the eyebrows.
1953 Le Roi jouant avec la Reine by Ernst
2022 SOLD for $ 24.4M by Christie's
A Dadaist and a Surrealist, Max Ernst enjoyed fancy. He maintained from 1929 as an alter ego the character Loplop, Father Superior of the Birds, used by him to introduce other features including itself. He began to sculpt in 1934 with his then fellow surrealist Giacometti.
Ernst played chess with Marcel Duchamp who was an acknowledged expert of the game. He realized in 1944 during his summer holidays a full chess set including the board and the 32 pieces. He played also with his partner and future wife Dorothea Tanning.
Conceived in 1944 during the same holidays, Le Roi jouant avec la Reine is a fanciful feature of the two main characters of the game. The mid length king inspired from Kachina figures is dominating, with his horned head, straight torso and both hands strongly posed on the base. His attitude reminds a player studying the game. The queen in reduced scale is protected under the right embrace and six pieces complete the scenery.
Ernst presented the plaster to fellow artist Robert Motherwell. Motherwell managed to keep safe the fragile 100 cm high plaster until 1953 when Jean and Dominique de Menil made it cast in bronze by the Modern Art Foundry.
The production of nine bronzes spanned from 1953 to 1961. An undated and not numbered example with brown patina was sold for $ 24.4M from a lower estimate of $ 8M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 40.
Only 4 copies have been numbered. The number 1, also not dated, was sold for $ 16M by Sotheby's on May 16, 2017, lot 4. It had belonged to the De Menils until ca 1973.
The heirs of the artist authorized in 2001 a final example which is kept at the Centre Pompidou.
Ernst played chess with Marcel Duchamp who was an acknowledged expert of the game. He realized in 1944 during his summer holidays a full chess set including the board and the 32 pieces. He played also with his partner and future wife Dorothea Tanning.
Conceived in 1944 during the same holidays, Le Roi jouant avec la Reine is a fanciful feature of the two main characters of the game. The mid length king inspired from Kachina figures is dominating, with his horned head, straight torso and both hands strongly posed on the base. His attitude reminds a player studying the game. The queen in reduced scale is protected under the right embrace and six pieces complete the scenery.
Ernst presented the plaster to fellow artist Robert Motherwell. Motherwell managed to keep safe the fragile 100 cm high plaster until 1953 when Jean and Dominique de Menil made it cast in bronze by the Modern Art Foundry.
The production of nine bronzes spanned from 1953 to 1961. An undated and not numbered example with brown patina was sold for $ 24.4M from a lower estimate of $ 8M by Christie's on November 9, 2022, lot 40.
Only 4 copies have been numbered. The number 1, also not dated, was sold for $ 16M by Sotheby's on May 16, 2017, lot 4. It had belonged to the De Menils until ca 1973.
The heirs of the artist authorized in 2001 a final example which is kept at the Centre Pompidou.
1962 LICHTENSTEIN
1
The Ring
2015 SOLD for $ 42M by Sotheby's
Look Mickey by Roy Lichtenstein in 1961 is the turning point of modern art. The picture is figurative, popular (with Disney's characters) impossible (animals that mimic humans), burlesque, and even animated by its text which assesses what has gone before and what will happen afterwards.
Leo Castelli immediately understands the importance of this artwork. Roy also. The artist rushes into love and war comics, considered as a minor art but enormously appealing to the public. His technique of showing the printing dots in scale across the very large magnification of his art and of keeping the pure colors is clever because it makes the connection between his inspiration and his work.
Roy finds what he is looking for. The source is abundant and the path is unexplored. The designer of the original comics created unknowingly some masterpieces of emotional imaging. For him, the scene was inseparable from the story. By isolating some simple images with or without a phylactery, Roy met the challenge of providing an art altogether major and popular.
The Ring (engagement), oil on canvas 123 x 178 cm painted in 1962, is one of the largest by this artist at that time. It was sold for $ 42M by Sotheby's on May 12, 2015, lot 15.
A man's hand presents the ring to the finger of a woman. That's it. This is the representation of one of the most important rites of passage of our civilization. We will not know anything more of this new couple, but the position of the hands expresses the mutual trust that sublimes such act.
Leo Castelli immediately understands the importance of this artwork. Roy also. The artist rushes into love and war comics, considered as a minor art but enormously appealing to the public. His technique of showing the printing dots in scale across the very large magnification of his art and of keeping the pure colors is clever because it makes the connection between his inspiration and his work.
Roy finds what he is looking for. The source is abundant and the path is unexplored. The designer of the original comics created unknowingly some masterpieces of emotional imaging. For him, the scene was inseparable from the story. By isolating some simple images with or without a phylactery, Roy met the challenge of providing an art altogether major and popular.
The Ring (engagement), oil on canvas 123 x 178 cm painted in 1962, is one of the largest by this artist at that time. It was sold for $ 42M by Sotheby's on May 12, 2015, lot 15.
A man's hand presents the ring to the finger of a woman. That's it. This is the representation of one of the most important rites of passage of our civilization. We will not know anything more of this new couple, but the position of the hands expresses the mutual trust that sublimes such act.
2
Kiss
2019 SOLD for $ 31M by Christie's
With Pop Art, painting leaves away from the intellectual circles. The emotion offered by the abstract expressionists had been reserved for an elite who accepted to spend some time in looking for an empathy.
The multiplication of images has become a feature of the consumer society. In the magazine, on the poster, in the street, it needs to be both simple and striking for achieving its goal : to sell, even if the product for sale is mediocre.
Roy Lichtenstein's art does not target elites. It speaks to everyone. When they see a picture, people like to relate it to what they already know, to transpose into themselves the feelings expressed by the character.
Roy cuts out in comic books the images that he enlarges up to the size of a work of art. The original strip is not made available, further exciting the imagination of the viewer as to the course of the action. The young woman, alone or with a man, is one of the favorite themes of the artist.
Away from art fashions and deaf to criticism, Roy can afford all the audacities. His early Pop Art works often copy a phylactery from the original image. The following speech by a blonde to a painter takes the strength of a manifesto when it is transposed in large format : "Why, Brad darling. This painting is a masterpiece! My, soon you'll have all of New York clamoring for your work!". This artwork 137 x 137 cm painted in 1962 was sold for $ 165 million in a private transaction in January 2017.
Kiss III, acrylic on canvas 163 x 122 cm also painted in 1962, was sold for $ 31M by Christie's on May 15, 2019. lot 7 B .
Kiss III stages a man and a woman in a loving embrace, without a speech bubble. They are not beautiful and the drawing is too simple : art no longer needs aesthetics. The patterns of dots that create the colors of the skin and of one of the clothes are reminiscent of the screened origin of this image from (or supposed to come from) a popular magazine.
The multiplication of images has become a feature of the consumer society. In the magazine, on the poster, in the street, it needs to be both simple and striking for achieving its goal : to sell, even if the product for sale is mediocre.
Roy Lichtenstein's art does not target elites. It speaks to everyone. When they see a picture, people like to relate it to what they already know, to transpose into themselves the feelings expressed by the character.
Roy cuts out in comic books the images that he enlarges up to the size of a work of art. The original strip is not made available, further exciting the imagination of the viewer as to the course of the action. The young woman, alone or with a man, is one of the favorite themes of the artist.
Away from art fashions and deaf to criticism, Roy can afford all the audacities. His early Pop Art works often copy a phylactery from the original image. The following speech by a blonde to a painter takes the strength of a manifesto when it is transposed in large format : "Why, Brad darling. This painting is a masterpiece! My, soon you'll have all of New York clamoring for your work!". This artwork 137 x 137 cm painted in 1962 was sold for $ 165 million in a private transaction in January 2017.
Kiss III, acrylic on canvas 163 x 122 cm also painted in 1962, was sold for $ 31M by Christie's on May 15, 2019. lot 7 B .
Kiss III stages a man and a woman in a loving embrace, without a speech bubble. They are not beautiful and the drawing is too simple : art no longer needs aesthetics. The patterns of dots that create the colors of the skin and of one of the clothes are reminiscent of the screened origin of this image from (or supposed to come from) a popular magazine.
1967 L'Aubade by Picasso
2011 SOLD for $ 23M by Sotheby's
After a long illness Pablo Picasso takes his brushes again at the end of 1966. He cannot smoke anymore and is sexually disabled. He compensates for this handicap by the theme of the sensuality of the woman in love.
The woman exhibits her whole anatomy in various positions. In the feverish imagination of Picasso, she is Jacqueline, although Jacqueline never posed for him. The man is naked at her side, often without the attributes of an artist. In the same period, Picasso also confronts the nude woman with other emanations of himself such as the musician.
Since the Middle Ages, music accompanies the joy of living in love. In the morning, the musician is enchanting the lovers with the aubade. In the evening, he concludes the day with the serenade.
Jacqueline Picasso, naked, is still in bed. Beside her, a fiery bearded Faun plays the flute, symbolic instrument of original music. The hirsute character is her husband, Pablo, who is both the musician and the lover of this aubade.
Jacqueline is in ecstasy, both eyes wide open. On this oil on canvas 130 x 195 cm painted in 1967, the woman's face is barely cubist, but one of her cheeks is distorted as if it were drawn by the flute.
Picasso, then 86 years old, wanted to stay young forever and continue to enjoy the sensory pleasures. The friendly side of this otherwise exuberant work is the gift of music to the beloved.
This painting was sold for $ 23M by Sotheby's on November 2, 2011, lot 35.
The woman exhibits her whole anatomy in various positions. In the feverish imagination of Picasso, she is Jacqueline, although Jacqueline never posed for him. The man is naked at her side, often without the attributes of an artist. In the same period, Picasso also confronts the nude woman with other emanations of himself such as the musician.
Since the Middle Ages, music accompanies the joy of living in love. In the morning, the musician is enchanting the lovers with the aubade. In the evening, he concludes the day with the serenade.
Jacqueline Picasso, naked, is still in bed. Beside her, a fiery bearded Faun plays the flute, symbolic instrument of original music. The hirsute character is her husband, Pablo, who is both the musician and the lover of this aubade.
Jacqueline is in ecstasy, both eyes wide open. On this oil on canvas 130 x 195 cm painted in 1967, the woman's face is barely cubist, but one of her cheeks is distorted as if it were drawn by the flute.
Picasso, then 86 years old, wanted to stay young forever and continue to enjoy the sensory pleasures. The friendly side of this otherwise exuberant work is the gift of music to the beloved.
This painting was sold for $ 23M by Sotheby's on November 2, 2011, lot 35.
1980 Tibetan Shepherds by Chen Danqing
2021 SOLD for RMB 160M by Poly
Chen Danqing graduated in 1980 with his Tibetan series at the Oil Painting Department of the Central Academy of Fine Arts.
This series is made of seven paintings executed in Lhassa between 1978 and 1980. Fully departing from the official propagandist art, it was featuring humanistic scenes of the harsh daily life of non-Han people. The artist had been influenced by an exhibition of French countryside artists of the 19th century including Courbet, Millet and Bastien-Lepage.
Displayed at the 1980 Exhibition of Graduates of the Academy, the series was immediately applauded as the triggering as a post Maoist art with a come back to the emotional. Chairman Mao had died in 1976. That exhibition also featured Father by Luo Zhongli.
The seventh and last opus, titled Shepherds, is the most emotional. A Tibetan man and a Tibetan woman are exchanging a loving kiss. They are standing in their heavy Tibetan coats against a parapet in the countryside near Lhassa.
This oil on panel 79 x 52 cm was sold by Poly for RMB 36M in 2007 and for RMB 160M on June 4, 2021, lot 3307.
This rendering of rustic civilizations anticipate the 1981 scene of Kirghiz wrestling by Huang Zhou, sold for RMB 130M by Poly on December 2, 2013, lot 1921, and the scenes in Tibet by Chen Yifei of which an example painted in 1994 was sold for RMB 81M by China Guardian on May 21, 2011.
This series is made of seven paintings executed in Lhassa between 1978 and 1980. Fully departing from the official propagandist art, it was featuring humanistic scenes of the harsh daily life of non-Han people. The artist had been influenced by an exhibition of French countryside artists of the 19th century including Courbet, Millet and Bastien-Lepage.
Displayed at the 1980 Exhibition of Graduates of the Academy, the series was immediately applauded as the triggering as a post Maoist art with a come back to the emotional. Chairman Mao had died in 1976. That exhibition also featured Father by Luo Zhongli.
The seventh and last opus, titled Shepherds, is the most emotional. A Tibetan man and a Tibetan woman are exchanging a loving kiss. They are standing in their heavy Tibetan coats against a parapet in the countryside near Lhassa.
This oil on panel 79 x 52 cm was sold by Poly for RMB 36M in 2007 and for RMB 160M on June 4, 2021, lot 3307.
This rendering of rustic civilizations anticipate the 1981 scene of Kirghiz wrestling by Huang Zhou, sold for RMB 130M by Poly on December 2, 2013, lot 1921, and the scenes in Tibet by Chen Yifei of which an example painted in 1994 was sold for RMB 81M by China Guardian on May 21, 2011.
1982 Double Portrait by Basquiat
2013 SOLD for £ 18.8M by Christie's
In 1981, Jean-Michel Basquiat rushed like a rocket in the world of art. Despite his young age, his painting technique is complex and flawless. He paints the fearsome gods of the pantheon of his imagination.
Success came immediately. In 1982, he diversified his grammar. Compared to most of the works of the previous year, a double portrait in diptych is remarkably optimistic.
The colors in acrylic and oilstick are pure and bright. The drawing reminds the frenetic graffiti, as if the work had been painted on a white wall. Using a large format is essential for highlighting the art of our time.
The two characters of different colors in a non-identifiable external environment are looking straight at the viewer. In the very specific style of Basquiat, they are as ugly as the couples of tourists by Duane Hanson, but for once they are happy.
This panel 183 x 244 cm overall was sold for £ 18.8M by Christie's on June 25, 2013, lot 25.
Success came immediately. In 1982, he diversified his grammar. Compared to most of the works of the previous year, a double portrait in diptych is remarkably optimistic.
The colors in acrylic and oilstick are pure and bright. The drawing reminds the frenetic graffiti, as if the work had been painted on a white wall. Using a large format is essential for highlighting the art of our time.
The two characters of different colors in a non-identifiable external environment are looking straight at the viewer. In the very specific style of Basquiat, they are as ugly as the couples of tourists by Duane Hanson, but for once they are happy.
This panel 183 x 244 cm overall was sold for £ 18.8M by Christie's on June 25, 2013, lot 25.
