Sleeping Goddess
101.6 cms x 228.6 cms (40 ins x 90 ins)
Signed and dated verso
Lot offered for sale by BYDealers, Montréal at the auction event "Post-war and Contemporary" held on Sun, May 26, 2019.
Lot 50
Lot 50
Estimate: CAD $15,000 - $20,000
Realised: CAD $19,200
Realised: CAD $19,200
Lot description - from the online catalogue*
Provenance:
Galerie Riverin-Arlogos, Québec
Private collection, Montréal
Literature:
This work will be included in the forthcoming publication Norman Bluhm: Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings, edited by John Yau.
Notes:
At the close of the 1960s, Norman Bluhm was on the cusp of a significant critical transformation. Although he acknowledged the vital role played by the New York School artists (de Kooning and Kline in particular) in the evolution of his aesthetic, by the 1960s Bluhm had already begun to question the limitations of Abstract Expressionism. In keeping with his academic training - Bluhm had studied art and architecture under Mies van der Rohe, and then fine art at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris - he returned to the practice of drawing from the nude model. He also began to incorporate art-historical references into his paintings. Over the course of the 1970s, his rectilinear brushstrokes softened and coiled into curvilinear abstract female forms suggestive of the Western art-historical tradition of the reclining nude. With colours becoming increasingly saturated and titles rooted in Greek mythology, such as Aphrodite, Niobe, and Persephone, he emphasized the feminine and referenced the Classical.
Sleeping Goddess is an exemplary illustration of Bluhm's work from this period, which reached its pinnacle in the early 1980s. Curvaceous, organic shapes evocative of the female form, rendered in a symphony of purple, violet, and fuchsia, appear against a rippling ground of burnt umber and a sky of turquoise. Through its masterful synthesis of gestural abstraction and classical painting, Sleeping Goddess is proof of the great scope of Bluhm's artistic innovation. Poet and art critic Raphael Rubinstein rightly asserts that Bluhm "has single-handedly reconciled the emotional directness and raw energy of Abstract Expressionism with the visual symphonics of Old Master European painting" (Harithas, Rubenstein and Sansone, Norman Bluhm, Mazzotta, 2000).
Galerie Riverin-Arlogos, Québec
Private collection, Montréal
Literature:
This work will be included in the forthcoming publication Norman Bluhm: Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings, edited by John Yau.
Notes:
At the close of the 1960s, Norman Bluhm was on the cusp of a significant critical transformation. Although he acknowledged the vital role played by the New York School artists (de Kooning and Kline in particular) in the evolution of his aesthetic, by the 1960s Bluhm had already begun to question the limitations of Abstract Expressionism. In keeping with his academic training - Bluhm had studied art and architecture under Mies van der Rohe, and then fine art at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris - he returned to the practice of drawing from the nude model. He also began to incorporate art-historical references into his paintings. Over the course of the 1970s, his rectilinear brushstrokes softened and coiled into curvilinear abstract female forms suggestive of the Western art-historical tradition of the reclining nude. With colours becoming increasingly saturated and titles rooted in Greek mythology, such as Aphrodite, Niobe, and Persephone, he emphasized the feminine and referenced the Classical.
Sleeping Goddess is an exemplary illustration of Bluhm's work from this period, which reached its pinnacle in the early 1980s. Curvaceous, organic shapes evocative of the female form, rendered in a symphony of purple, violet, and fuchsia, appear against a rippling ground of burnt umber and a sky of turquoise. Through its masterful synthesis of gestural abstraction and classical painting, Sleeping Goddess is proof of the great scope of Bluhm's artistic innovation. Poet and art critic Raphael Rubinstein rightly asserts that Bluhm "has single-handedly reconciled the emotional directness and raw energy of Abstract Expressionism with the visual symphonics of Old Master European painting" (Harithas, Rubenstein and Sansone, Norman Bluhm, Mazzotta, 2000).
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 BYDealers auction house for permission to use.
(*) Text and/or Image might be subject matter of Copyright. Check with BYDealers auction house for permission to use.