Flute Passage
81.3 cms x 109.2 cms (32 ins x 43 ins)
On verso signed, titled, dated november 1975, inscribed "toronto" and stamped with the andré emmerich gallery stamp
made in 1975
Lot offered for sale by Heffel, Vancouver at the auction event "Spring 2015 Live auction" held on Wed, May 27, 2015.
Lot 045a
Lot 045a
Estimate: CAD $125,000 - $175,000
Did not sell
Did not sell
Lot description - from the online catalogue*
Provenance:
André Emmerich Gallery, New York
Gallery One, Toronto
Collection of Joseph Drapell, Toronto
Private Collection, Toronto
Exhibitions:
André Emmerich Gallery, New York, Jack Bush: Paintings 1973 - 1976, February 5 - 26, 1981
Freedman Art, New York, Jack Bush: New York Visit, February 18 - April 28, 2012
Literature:
Jack Bush: Paintings 1973 - 1976, André Emmerich Gallery, 1981, reproduced unpaginated
Marc Mayer and Sarah Stanners, Jack Bush, National Gallery of Canada, 2014, page 31
Notes:
Jack Bush began his career as an illustrator and went on to produce first-rate commercial work for 40 years. He worked in the commercial art firm that had once employed Tom Thomson and five members of the Group of Seven, then known as Rapid Grip Ltd., an amalgamation of the Rapid Electrotype Company and the original Grip Ltd. Although Bush had been keenly interested in illustration since his youth and was an extremely talented illustrator, he aspired to be a fine art painter. While time constraints dictated that he could paint for his own purposes only in his time off, he was dedicated to this pursuit, practising life drawing regularly and devoting much of his time to further study. Once he had married and started a family, he began to feel overwhelmed with the conflicting pressure between his domestic responsibility and role as a wage earner and his desire to push his art further and strike out into the avant-garde. These conflicting priorities became increasingly stressful, so in 1947 Bush began seeing psychiatrist Dr. J. Allan Walters. Walters suggested that Bush use his painting time to create experimental works and to deal with his anxieties. He advised him to empty his inner feelings and moods completely into them, without preconceived ideas concerning the outcome - to paint out his stresses, and to just be himself. Bush did so, creating abstract works comprised of bold colours set on a solid ground. He would begin to show these works within the year and with considerable success. Additionally, on Dr. Walter's advice, Bush would begin to keep a diary to accompany the paintings. Bush's works, when viewed within the context of his diaries, are a play-by-play account of the successes and sorrows of his life.
Bush took inspiration from everything he encountered: the activities of his children, the colour of his wife's dress, flowers in his garden, the pain he felt during his tests for angina. All of these things became subjects that were realized with utter clarity through the simplification of the idea as it affected him, transferred into colour and shape.
By the time Flute Passage was painted in 1975, Bush had begun to use a sponge to apply the grounds on his canvases. Somewhat painterly and rather organic, these mottled grounds were an unusual step for Bush, but would remain a part of his work until the end of his life. By this time Bush was a celebrated master of flatness, and this addition of texture, albeit an illusion of texture, was an unexpected turn for the artist. At first these mottled grounds were subject to the addition of motifs we now call Totems - oblong shapes of various colours placed end to end on the ground. By 1974 the Totems had broken apart, becoming separate patches of colour - individual marks with a distinct life of their own. Bush's titles during this time were drawn from music - he had been given a dictionary of musical terms, which, combined with his own lifelong love of music, jazz in particular, would lead to works such as Flute Passage. What makes these works so distinct, in addition to the mottled ground, is their sense of sheer, unbridled joy. Paintings from this last part of Bush's career are described by Marc Meyer as "untethered but rhythmically synchronized as they merrily animate the picture plane. After years of praise, Jack Bush was now having no trouble 'just being himself' and the musical family life he shared with his wife and sons finally invaded the canvas."
André Emmerich Gallery, New York
Gallery One, Toronto
Collection of Joseph Drapell, Toronto
Private Collection, Toronto
Exhibitions:
André Emmerich Gallery, New York, Jack Bush: Paintings 1973 - 1976, February 5 - 26, 1981
Freedman Art, New York, Jack Bush: New York Visit, February 18 - April 28, 2012
Literature:
Jack Bush: Paintings 1973 - 1976, André Emmerich Gallery, 1981, reproduced unpaginated
Marc Mayer and Sarah Stanners, Jack Bush, National Gallery of Canada, 2014, page 31
Notes:
Jack Bush began his career as an illustrator and went on to produce first-rate commercial work for 40 years. He worked in the commercial art firm that had once employed Tom Thomson and five members of the Group of Seven, then known as Rapid Grip Ltd., an amalgamation of the Rapid Electrotype Company and the original Grip Ltd. Although Bush had been keenly interested in illustration since his youth and was an extremely talented illustrator, he aspired to be a fine art painter. While time constraints dictated that he could paint for his own purposes only in his time off, he was dedicated to this pursuit, practising life drawing regularly and devoting much of his time to further study. Once he had married and started a family, he began to feel overwhelmed with the conflicting pressure between his domestic responsibility and role as a wage earner and his desire to push his art further and strike out into the avant-garde. These conflicting priorities became increasingly stressful, so in 1947 Bush began seeing psychiatrist Dr. J. Allan Walters. Walters suggested that Bush use his painting time to create experimental works and to deal with his anxieties. He advised him to empty his inner feelings and moods completely into them, without preconceived ideas concerning the outcome - to paint out his stresses, and to just be himself. Bush did so, creating abstract works comprised of bold colours set on a solid ground. He would begin to show these works within the year and with considerable success. Additionally, on Dr. Walter's advice, Bush would begin to keep a diary to accompany the paintings. Bush's works, when viewed within the context of his diaries, are a play-by-play account of the successes and sorrows of his life.
Bush took inspiration from everything he encountered: the activities of his children, the colour of his wife's dress, flowers in his garden, the pain he felt during his tests for angina. All of these things became subjects that were realized with utter clarity through the simplification of the idea as it affected him, transferred into colour and shape.
By the time Flute Passage was painted in 1975, Bush had begun to use a sponge to apply the grounds on his canvases. Somewhat painterly and rather organic, these mottled grounds were an unusual step for Bush, but would remain a part of his work until the end of his life. By this time Bush was a celebrated master of flatness, and this addition of texture, albeit an illusion of texture, was an unexpected turn for the artist. At first these mottled grounds were subject to the addition of motifs we now call Totems - oblong shapes of various colours placed end to end on the ground. By 1974 the Totems had broken apart, becoming separate patches of colour - individual marks with a distinct life of their own. Bush's titles during this time were drawn from music - he had been given a dictionary of musical terms, which, combined with his own lifelong love of music, jazz in particular, would lead to works such as Flute Passage. What makes these works so distinct, in addition to the mottled ground, is their sense of sheer, unbridled joy. Paintings from this last part of Bush's career are described by Marc Meyer as "untethered but rhythmically synchronized as they merrily animate the picture plane. After years of praise, Jack Bush was now having no trouble 'just being himself' and the musical family life he shared with his wife and sons finally invaded the canvas."
Most realised prices include the Buyer's Premium of 18-25%, but not the HST/GST Tax.
(*) Text and/or Image might be subject matter of Copyright. Check with Heffel auction house for permission to use.
(*) Text and/or Image might be subject matter of Copyright. Check with Heffel auction house for permission to use.