Object
91.4 cms x 61 cms (36 ins x 24 ins)
Signed; Dated 1953, 1954 And Circa 1954 On Three Gallery Labels On The Reverse
made in 1953
Lot offered for sale by Waddington's, Toronto at the auction event "Canadian Fine Art Auction - Monday 26 May 2014" held on Mon, May 26, 2014.
Lot 62
Lot 62
Estimate: CAD $70,000 - $90,000
Realised: CAD $118,000
Realised: CAD $118,000
Lot description - from the online catalogue*
Provenance:
Estate of the artist
Mrs. Cahén-Egglefield (1984)
The Drabinsky Gallery, Toronto
Private Collection, Toronto
Exhibitions:
Canadian Group of Painters, 1954 Exhibition.
Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota Florida, n.d.
Oscar Cahén, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto December 16-February 12, 1984, other venues, cat. no. 16.
Abstract(s) at Home, The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa, Ontario September 21, 2007-September 21, 2008.
Literature:
David Burnett, Oscar Cahén, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, 1983, page 32, reproduced.
Iris Nowell, Painters Eleven: The Wild Ones of Canadian Art, Toronto, 2010, page 148, reproduced in colour.
Notes:
Cahén was one of the principal innovators of Canadian abstraction in the 1950s; Object is one of his most accomplished and favoured works. Although the artist was prolific during this period of his life, he elected to choose to represent himself three times with this work at exhibitions in important venues. Following his untimely accidental death in 1956, this work was included in both retrospective exhibitions of his work and remained a staple at subsequent exhibitions.
In the late 1940s the allover approach dominated progressive abstract painting. Personified by Pollock's drip paintings and in Canada by related works by Riopelle, Borduas and the Automatistes, advanced artists treated the entire surface of a painting in a unified, cohesive way, covering every surface with consistent, related impasto marks and painterly gestures, corner to corner. By the early 1950s this direction had run its course; art sought new solutions and options. Pollock returned to abstracted representation referencing Cubism and Surrealism.
Cahén's training and proclivities had always headed him in the direction of narrative and figuration. As such, he never did become immersed in the allover textural treatment of the painting surface. His work of the late 1940s explored humanism through the stylistic mechanism of Expressionist tendencies. For many in this time period, including Cahén, artists yearned through their work to purge the anxieties and anguish suffered through World War II by creating dour, moody works of emotional intensity. Object turns the corner.
In the work immediately prior, Cahén created a cast of stylized characters that played out a range of emotions. Object is ostensibly an abstract formal composition. Yet, upon examination it returns to more classical figure/ground construction. Is the central form simply a mass: an “object”? Or might it be an abstracted personage, with central torso and appendages within the spirit of surrealist Max Ernst? Object is cunningly crafted. It is built in two zones, a diagonal split contrasting areas of warm and cool colouration. Cahén orchestrates the transition such that the painting holds together as a unified whole, not a painting split in two parts. Object employs what will become key signature Cahén colour treatment: striking combinations of magenta, orange, red and pink in counterpoint with vibrant cyan blues and green. Object is a confident, joyous, vibrant picture that commences the march out of the doldrums of the hangover of war and depression and heralds the embrace, vibrancy and optimism of the new age.
We thank Jeffrey Spalding for providing the essay for this lot.
Estate of the artist
Mrs. Cahén-Egglefield (1984)
The Drabinsky Gallery, Toronto
Private Collection, Toronto
Exhibitions:
Canadian Group of Painters, 1954 Exhibition.
Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota Florida, n.d.
Oscar Cahén, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto December 16-February 12, 1984, other venues, cat. no. 16.
Abstract(s) at Home, The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa, Ontario September 21, 2007-September 21, 2008.
Literature:
David Burnett, Oscar Cahén, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, 1983, page 32, reproduced.
Iris Nowell, Painters Eleven: The Wild Ones of Canadian Art, Toronto, 2010, page 148, reproduced in colour.
Notes:
Cahén was one of the principal innovators of Canadian abstraction in the 1950s; Object is one of his most accomplished and favoured works. Although the artist was prolific during this period of his life, he elected to choose to represent himself three times with this work at exhibitions in important venues. Following his untimely accidental death in 1956, this work was included in both retrospective exhibitions of his work and remained a staple at subsequent exhibitions.
In the late 1940s the allover approach dominated progressive abstract painting. Personified by Pollock's drip paintings and in Canada by related works by Riopelle, Borduas and the Automatistes, advanced artists treated the entire surface of a painting in a unified, cohesive way, covering every surface with consistent, related impasto marks and painterly gestures, corner to corner. By the early 1950s this direction had run its course; art sought new solutions and options. Pollock returned to abstracted representation referencing Cubism and Surrealism.
Cahén's training and proclivities had always headed him in the direction of narrative and figuration. As such, he never did become immersed in the allover textural treatment of the painting surface. His work of the late 1940s explored humanism through the stylistic mechanism of Expressionist tendencies. For many in this time period, including Cahén, artists yearned through their work to purge the anxieties and anguish suffered through World War II by creating dour, moody works of emotional intensity. Object turns the corner.
In the work immediately prior, Cahén created a cast of stylized characters that played out a range of emotions. Object is ostensibly an abstract formal composition. Yet, upon examination it returns to more classical figure/ground construction. Is the central form simply a mass: an “object”? Or might it be an abstracted personage, with central torso and appendages within the spirit of surrealist Max Ernst? Object is cunningly crafted. It is built in two zones, a diagonal split contrasting areas of warm and cool colouration. Cahén orchestrates the transition such that the painting holds together as a unified whole, not a painting split in two parts. Object employs what will become key signature Cahén colour treatment: striking combinations of magenta, orange, red and pink in counterpoint with vibrant cyan blues and green. Object is a confident, joyous, vibrant picture that commences the march out of the doldrums of the hangover of war and depression and heralds the embrace, vibrancy and optimism of the new age.
We thank Jeffrey Spalding for providing the essay for this lot.
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 Waddington's auction house for permission to use.
(*) Text and/or Image might be subject matter of Copyright. Check with Waddington's auction house for permission to use.