Zao Wou-Ki

"Hommage a Nobutaka Shikanai, " Zao Wou-Ki, Abstract Lithograph Mid-century Print

1991

Theresa Bernstein The Gathering, circa 1990 Signed lower right Mixed media on paper 9 x 10 3/4 inches Theresa F. Bernstein was born in Philadelphia in 1895 to cultured, middle-clas...

David Hare Cronus Waiting, 1990 Ink and Wash on Paper on Board 34 x 25 1/4 inches “Freedom is what we want,” David Hare boldly stated in 1965, but then he added the caveat, “and what we are most afraid of.” No one could accuse David Hare of possessing such fear. Blithely unconcerned with the critics’ judgments, Hare flitted through most of the major art developments of the mid-twentieth century in the United States. He changed mediums several times; just when his fame as a sculptor had reached its apogee about 1960, he switched over to painting. Yet he remained attached to surrealism long after it had fallen out of official favor. “I can’t change what I do in order to fit what would make me popular,” he said. “Not because of moral reasons, but just because I can’t do it; I’m not interested in it.” Hare was born in New York City in 1917; his family was both wealthy and familiar with the world of modern art. Meredith (1870-1932), his father, was a prominent corporate attorney. His mother, Elizabeth Sage Goodwin (1878-1948) was an art collector, a financial backer of the 1913 Armory Show, and a friend of artists such as Constantin Brancusi, Walt Kuhn, and Marcel Duchamp. In the 1920s, the entire family moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico and later to Colorado Springs, in the hope that the change in altitude and climate would help to heal Meredith’s tuberculosis. In Colorado Springs, Elizabeth founded the Fountain Valley School where David attended high school after his father died in 1932. In the western United States, Hare developed a fascination for kachina dolls and other aspects of Native American culture that would become a recurring source of inspiration in his career. After high school, Hare briefly attended Bard College (1936-37) in Annandale-on-Hudson. At a loss as to what to do next, he parlayed his mother’s contacts into opening a commercial photography studio and began dabbling in color photography, still a rarity at the time [Kodachrome was introduced in 1935]. At age 22, Hare had his first solo exhibition at Walker Gallery in New York City; his 30 color photographs included one of President Franklin Roosevelt. As a photographer, Hare experimented with an automatist technique called “heatage” (or “melted negatives”) in which he heated the negative in order to distort the image. Hare described them as “antagonisms of matter.” The final products were usually abstractions tending towards surrealism and similar to processes used by Man Ray, Raoul Ubac, and Wolfgang Paalen. In 1940, Hare moved to Roxbury, CT, where he fraternized with neighboring artists such as Alexander Calder and Arshile Gorky, as well as Yves Tanguy who was married to Hare’s cousin Kay Sage, and the art dealer Julian Levy. The same year, Hare received a commission from the American Museum of Natural History to document the Pueblo Indians. He traveled to Santa Fe and, for several months, he took portrait photographs of members of the Hopi, Navajo, and Zuni tribes that were published in book form in 1941. World War II turned Hare’s life upside down. He became a conduit in the exchange of artistic and intellectual ideas between U.S. artists and the surrealist émigrés fleeing Europe. In 1942, Hare befriended Andre Breton, the principal theorist of surrealism. When Breton wanted to publish a magazine to promote the movement in the United States, he could not serve as an editor because he was a foreign national. Instead, Breton selected Hare to edit the journal, entitled VVV [shorth for “Victory, Victory, Victory”], which ran for four issues (the second and third issues were printed as a single volume) from June 1942 to February 1944. Each edition of VVV focused on “poetry, plastic arts, anthropology, sociology, (and) psychology,” and was extensively illustrated by surrealist artists including Giorgio de Chirico, Roberto Matta, and Yves Tanguy; Max Ernst and Marcel Duchamp served as editorial advisors. At the suggestion of Jacqueline Lamba...

À la gloire de l'image et art poétique, 1976 by Zao Wou-ki Printed by Ediciones Polígrafia, Barcelona The portfolio, comprising 15 Lithographs in color, With the printed signatures and dates on each. accompanied by the title page and text in French by Roger Callois, lacking the justification, loose, as issued, contained in a paper wrapper, lacking the cloth wrapper case, with central fold as issued. image 40 x 67 cm; sheet 49.7 x 71.6 cm image 15 ³/₄ x 26 ³/₈ cm; sheet 19 ⁹/₁₆ x 28 ³/₁₆ cm Edition of 300 plus 15 Artist Proofs. Literature: Catalogue Raisonné of Zao Wou-ki's graphic works (AGERUP) plates 271-285 About the Artist: Born in 1920 in Beijing, Zao Wou-Ki attended the National School of Arts, Hangzhou for six years under the supervision of Lin Fengmian...

Joan Miró - Maravillas con variaciones acrósticas en el jardín de Miró XX Date of creation: 1975 Medium: Lithograph on Gvarro paper Edition: 1500 Size: 49,5 x 35,5 cm Condition: In v...