Sam Francis was an American artist known for his exuberantly colorful, large-scale abstract paintings. His practice incorporated elements from Abstract Expressionism, Color Field painting, Impressionism and Eastern philosophy to create a unique style of painterly abstraction.
Influenced by Jackson Pollock and Clyfford Still, Francis is more closely associated to the work of Helen Frankenthaler, as he was more interested in the formal arrangement of the picture plane than the expressivity of the individual artist. “Painting is about the beauty of space and the power of containment,” Francis once reflected.
Born on June 25, 1923 in San Mateo, California, Francis briefly served in the US Air Force during World War II but was injured during a test flight. Returning to California, he received his BA and MA from UC Berkeley in botany and psychology before beginning to pursue a career in art. The artist traveled widely during his career, and he was closely aligned with the Art Informel movement while living abroad in Paris during the 1950s.
Francis died on November 4, 1994 in Santa Monica, California, at the age of 71. He was a founding trustee of Los Angeles’s Museum of Contemporary Art, and his paintings can be found in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Kunstmuseum Basel, and the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, among others.
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| Average Sold Price |
| $3,194 |
| Styles |
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$15,000
H 16 in W 22.5 in
Sam Francis, Karel Appel & Walasse Ting, lithographs, hand signed, 85/100 Framed
By Sam Francis
Located in New York, NY
From the rare, fully signed edition of One Cent Life - only 100 examples were hand signed by the artists. Exceptional provenance from Robert Indiana's estate. Sam Francis, Karel App...
Lithograph
$17,500
H 22.25 in W 30.1 in
Sam Francis, Blue-Violet, Lithograph, Stanford University Museum, Signed, Framed
By Sam Francis
Located in New York, NY
Sam Francis Blue-Violet (Lembark, L, 32), exhibited at Stanford University Art Museum, 1963 Color lithograph on Rives BFK paper with deckled edges Lithograph in blue-violet on Rives ...
Lithograph
$363
H 34.06 in W 11.62 in
Swatch : Color Explosion - Original lithograph (Mourlot, 1992)
By Sam Francis
Located in Paris, IDF
Sam FRANCIS Color explosion, 1992 Original lithograph Unsigned On Arches vellum 86.5 x 29.5 cm Numbered on the back Authenticated by Moulot blind stamp INFORMATION : Edited by Gale...
Lithograph
$9,685
H 37.5 in W 27 in
Sam Francis - Abstract Expressionist lithograph, Signed/N from Wolf Kahn Estate
By Sam Francis
Located in New York, NY
SAM FRANCIS Affiche Moderna Museet Stockholm (Catalogue Raisonne Lembark-16, p.66), 1960 Color lithograph on Rives BFK Paper with deckled edges Pencil signed lower right of center; n...
Lithograph
$700
H 15 in W 22 in
Untitled (SF-348) (Fresh Air School) /// Abstract Expressionist Sam Francis Art
By Sam Francis
Located in Saint Augustine, FL
Artist: Sam Francis (American, 1923-1994) Title: "Untitled (SF-348) (Fresh Air School)" Portfolio: Fresh Air School *Unsigned edition Year: 1972 Medium: Original Offset-Lithograph on...
Lithograph, Offset
$7,500
H 30.25 in W 23.25 in D 0.75 in
"Colors in Space II" (SF-95) Signed Printer's Proof Lithograph on Archival Paper
By Sam Francis
Located in Soquel, CA
"Colors in Space II" (SF-95) Signed Printer's Proof Lithograph on Archival Paper Bright and playful abstract composition by Sam Francis (American, 1923-1994). Splashes of yellow, or...
Archival Paper, Lithograph
$8,500
H 27 in W 35.25 in
Untitled (SF-355), Abstract Expressionist Lithograph by Sam Francis
By Sam Francis
Located in Long Island City, NY
Sam Francis, American (1923 - 1994) - Untitled (SF-355), Portfolio: Papierski Portfolio, Year: 1992, Medium: Lithograph on BFK Rives, signed and numbered in pencil, Edition: 50...
Lithograph
SF 89-153.
By Sam Francis
Located in Östermalm, Stockholms län
Artwork size: 67 x 51 cm. Frame size: 112 x 97 cm. Free shipment worldwide. Archive number SF 89-153 in the Sam Francis Foundation. Stamped with the Sam Francis Estate logo and stamped signature on verso. Sam Francis’s paintings are a journey into a dream, a voyage into the landscapes of the soul where colours are lights on fire. Alongside names such as Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning and Franz Kline, Sam Francis is an artist who has succeeded in demonstrating a total mastery of abstract expressionism’s impassioned and spontaneous genre. The explosions of colour – red, blue, green and yellow – the streaks, strokes and bold lines of his pictures are the physical synthesis of the deepest crevices of the soul. His colours create rhythmical motifs that, characteristically enough, can be called the “musicality” of his paintings. The work of Sam Francis provides a visible meeting place for the conscious and the unconscious. His pictures are the cross-fertilisation of what has already been experienced with what exists still only as desire, a struggle between melancholy and merrymaking. Influenced by C.G. Jung, the father of psychoanalysis, Sam Francis spent a large portion of his life exploring the premise that dreams, instincts and intuition provide, the keys which unlock the mysteries and meaning of our inner lives. He was also fascinated by the four ancient elements – earth, water, air and fire – which developed into a leitmotif in his work. Sam Francis was born in San Mateo in California, USA in 1923. After starting to paint at the age of around twenty, he soon found himself increasingly consumed by the power of art. He spent much of the 1950s in Paris, from where he not only made frequent excursions to a number of European cities, but also embarked on many journeys to South America and Asia. He continued to move from place to place, primarily in the USA and Japan, right up until his death in 1994. Sam Francis’s first...
Paper, Acrylic
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| $3,194 |
Average sold price of items in the past 12 months |
| $94-$10,000 |
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