Robert Collins

Ivory Abstract

Signed lower right 'G. Pisani', (Italian, born 1935), titled verso 'Paesaggio con Valigia' (Landscape with Luggage) and dated 1963. Provenance: Galleria El Centro, Naples, Italy 1963. (from original label, copied verso). A very substantial, mid-century abstracted landscape comprising an assembled group of Fendi shopping bags in the fashion designer's signature tones of cream, bistre and scarlet, shown contrasted against a lyrical, sunset-coral background. This powerful and lyrical oil was awarded the 1963 Michetti Painting Prize. Gianni Pisani studied at the Accademia de Bella Arti in Naples under Emilio Notte. Much of his career in the 1960s and 70s involved reinvigorating the Neapolitan art scene with assemblages, ‘object art’ and performance art, an approach that was critically described and acclaimed by poet and writer, Edoardo Sanguineti. The recipient of numerous medals, prizes and juried awards, including the Prize City Cesenatico (1955). Pisani exhibited widely and with success from the early 1950's including at the 8th Biennale of San Benedetto del Tronto (1969), Palazzo Dugnani (1983) and at the Non-Existent Gallery. Other solo and group exhibitions include a three-time participation in the National Quadrennial Art Shows (VIII, Rome, 1960; IX, Palazzo dei Esposizione, 1965/66; XI, Palazzo dei Congressi, 1986) and the 1995 Venice Biennale. An ardent exponent, and influential teacher, of Modernism, Pisani taught at the Academy of Fine Arts of Brera in Milan and, for many years, at the Academy of Fine Arts in Naples, of which he was later appointed director. Gianni Pisani’s works are held in the permanent collections of numerous museums including the Museum of Capodimonte, the Museum of Contemporary Art Donna Regina (MADRE), Museum of Contemporary Religious Art...

Signed lower right, 'Paul England' (American, 1918-1988) and painted circa 1965. With old label, verso, bearing title, 'Gutenburg'. Framed in a period wh...

Signed lower left "H. Plas" (French, born 1933) and dated 1971; inscribed verso "Champs de Velden" (Fields of Velden). A substantial Expressionist oil landscape showing a lyrical view of russet and gold fields bathed in evening sunlight outside the Dutch village...

Painted by Dora Masters (American, 1913-2003) and painted circa 1960. Stamped verso with certification of authenticity. Dora Masters exhibited widely and with success throughout th...

Signed lower left, 'Aung Aung Taik' (Burmese, born 1948) and dated 1981. Exhibited: San Francisco Cultural Center, 1981. A major work by this celebrate...

Signed verso with artist monogram 'DM' for Dora Maar (Argentine-French, 1907-1997); additionally impressed, upper left, with Dora Maar Estate stamp, Maison de la Chimie sale, Paris; October, 1998. In addition to her central role as Picasso's model and lover, Dora Maar served as his constant muse during the period of his creation of Guernica for which she also served as model for the lantern-holder, appearing at upper right. Prior to embarking on her two-year relationship with Picasso, Maar had already produced a widely-respected body of work and was celebrated as an influential and cutting-edge photographer. Nevertheless, it is her high-profile relationship with Picasso and her own personality- both in publications about Picasso and in those dedicated to her own life and work- that have acquired particular significance in art-historical literature. Maar's close link to the Surrealists, however, derived from her personal radiance and enigmatic personality as well as to the conscious and politically-informed artistic perspective that underlay her cutting-edge photomontages of the 1930s. Her increasingly radical political views during this period reinforced Picasso's own awareness of the deteriorating international political situation and of the civil war in his homeland. This heightened awareness culminated in the creation of "Guernica', his supreme artistic and political statement of the 1930's. Born in 1907, Henrietta Theodora Markovitch adopted the pen name of Dora Maar during the first years of her photography career. Growing up in Buenos Aires and Paris, she learned to speak French, Spanish and English fluently and, from 1927 on, attended the Art Academy of Andre L'Hote in Montparnasse. At the Academy, she studied painting but, by the end of the 1920s, she had transferred to the Ecole de Photographie de la Ville de Paris. In the early 1930s, she founded a photographic studio together with Pierre Kfer, who was later to make a career as stage designer. Numerous fashion and advertising photography shoots resulted from this collaboration and these were soon followed by her first Paris exhibitions. Dora Maar's photographic style during the 1930s show clear, surrealist characteristics. In her photographs and photomontages, she frequently played with shifting proportions, thus echoing an important feature of surrealist pictures. This tendency was augmented by the combination of disparate objects, which robs the photographs of their character of reflecting extreme reality, converting them to expressions of inner visions and psychic states. In parallel to these surreal photographs, Dora Maar produced sobering documentary photographs of her urban environments in Paris, London or Barcelona. Repeatedly, she records, in her photographs, the underprivileged, the unemployed and homeless, the socially disadvantaged and the physically deformed. It was precisely the simplicity of these photos that enabled Dora Maar to give the day-to-day and the ugly a magnificent monstrosity in which the beautiful and the horrible blend into one another. This recorded reality is thus accompanied by a level of inner associations, fears and visions. This present work, painted in the 1930's, remained in Dora Maar's possession until the end of her life, and shows her early interest in abstraction and her preoccupation with the complex inter-relationships of color and form. This painting is accompanied by a first edition copy of...

“Moving 5” is 60”x 48”. The vibrant yellow surface tones of this piece are broken in several places allowing random glimpses of Arnold’s dreamlike underpainting for a multi-dimension...

Frank Arnold is thought by many to be one of the foremost abstract figurative painters and sculptors of our time. He is a living master whose work is considered to be both personal a...

"A58" is 72” x 66”. The electric blues on black stand out from the figure on a mixed background of medium earth tones and heavy textures. Frank Arnold’s paintings exhibit the highest...

“OTL 8” is 60”x 60”. Central figure of Vibrant to deep reds on a split field of warm beige/coral and deep red/black. The foreground exhibits heavy strokes and Arnold’s “8” and “X” fi...

“Mentor” is 60”x 48” The impasto surface stages a bold sienna figure on a muted blue textured field. Frank Arnold’s paintings exhibit the highest quality materials for a truly archiv...

“Gone 5” is 40”x30” The impasto surface stages muted shades of greys and blue green enveloping the central figure. Frank Arnold’s paintings exhibit the highest quality materials for ...