In anticipation of next week's Sotheby's Contemporary Art Evening sale on 12 May, we take a look at some of the top works up for auction:
Cy Twombly, Untitled (Rome) (1970). Oil-based house paint and wax crayon on canvas. 154.9 x 194.9 cm. Estimate USD 35,000,000 - 45,000,000.
Keith Haring, Untitled (1986). Acrylic on canvas. 152.4 x 152.4 cm. Estimate USD 4,000,000 - 6,000,000.
Robert Colescott, George Washington Carver Crossing the Delaware: Page from an American History Textbook (1975). Acrylic on canvas. 199.4 x 294.6 cm. Estimate USD 9,000,000 - 12,000,000.
Sotheby's presents a brilliant selection of post-war abstract paintings at their upcoming New York auction, American Visionary: The Collection of Mrs. John L. Marion on 12 May.
Here are a number of our top picks:
Richard Diebenkorn, Ocean Park No.40 (1971). Oil on canvas. 236.2 x 205.1 cm. Estimate $20,000,000 - 30,000,000 USD.
Clyfford Still, PH-125 (1948-No.1) (1948). Oil on canvas. 187.3 x 172.7 cm. Estimate 25,000,000 - 35,000,000 USD.
Franz Kline, Mister (1959). Oil on canvas. 242.6 x 200.7 cm. 15,000,000 - 20,000,000 USD.
Jean-Michel Basquiat's In This Case is the groundbreaking work fronting Christie's 21st Century Evening Sale in New York on 11 May.
In This Case, along with Untitled (1981) and Untitled (1982) are understood as the 'holy trinity' of Basquiat's 'head' paintings, with the latter having gained particular notoriety for being the highest price ever fetched by an American artist after being sold at Sotheby's in 2017 for a little over $110 million.
In this Case has been exhibited in major surveys at Triennale Milano in 2006, Gagosian in 2013, and more recently, Fondation Louis Vuitton in 2018.
Hidden for 42 years in an attic outside of London, Frank Bowling's uncovered 1971 work Polish Rebecca is on show as part of his inaugural exhibition at Hauser & Wirth, which opened on 5 May in New York and will open on 21 May in London.
Featuring a large-scale stencilled map of South America and Africa, Polish Rebecca is a gleaming example of Bowling's 'Map Paintings' (1967–1971), an iconic series of works which marked his transition into pure abstraction, through the staining and pouring of acrylic paint onto silk screened images.
Featuring works from 1967 to the present day, Frank Bowling – London / New York is a wonderful display of Frank Bowling's extraordinary engagement with the materiality of paint, which has guided his search for abstraction throughout his 50-year career.
A survey of works by modernist master Joan Miró spanning the 1930s to the 1980s is now open at Simon de Pury's Newlands House Gallery in Petworth, U.K.
Comprising 39 sculptures, works on paper, prints, and a painting, the exhibition contains a selection of lesser-known works, with iconic pieces including Paris Mât (1971) and Torse (1969).
Miró's works throughout his eight-decade career are equally sought after and his 1969 bronze sculpture, Femme (Femme debout) is one to look out for the upcoming Christie's New York 20th Century Evening Sale on 13 May.
Ugo Rondinone's brilliantly garish pigmented rock stack sculpture series, 'Mountain', takes on a new two-dimensional form in his current solo exhibition at Sadie Coles HQ's Davies Street location.
With galleries open, you can now experience the true scale and wonderful painterly surface of these monumental works. The exhibition is on view until 22 May 2021.
Containing eye-popping sculptures and paintings weaving themes of consumption, the grotesque, and the search for transcendence, the exhibition Insomnia is Yuli Yamagata's first solo show at Fortes D'Aloia & Gabriel's São Paulo space opening on 15 May.
'The pieces in Insomnia point towards a sort of transition—a deceleration of image consumption. My wish is for the work to be absorbed at a slower pace, to linger in viewers' minds'—Yuli Yamagata in conversation with Rory Mitchell for Advisory Perspectives.
'I have never had a hang-up about art history; I see it as my artistic family, as oxygen. My generation emerged at a time of endings—death of painting, death of the author—and since I come from a place with no sense of culture at all, I had no desire to create a false tabula rasa.'—Thomas Houseago
Thomas Houseago's show of neoclassical and contemporary works opened on 22 April at Fine Arts Belgium and will be running until the beginning of August.
Containing verdant landscapes gleaned from the colour palettes of Romantic painters, Frank Walter's prolific autobiographical works are the subject of David Zwirner's first exhibition of the artist's work in London, running until 22 May 2021.
As Ocula Magazine Editor-in-Chief Stephanie Bailey wrote, Frank Walter's paintings reflect 'a journey in search of worlds capable of accommodating the depth and breadth of far-reaching hopes and visions. He was at once a product of his time and light years ahead of it; an artist who left universes to explore in his wake.'
Read more about Frank Walter's life and work exploring his lived postcolonial experience here.
Devoting her 40-year career to the documentation of political and social struggles during South Africa's apartheid, Sue Williamson presents her extraordinary first solo exhibition at Goodman Gallery in London, running until 24 April.
Included in this exhibition is her 1998 series 'Truth Games', consisting of sliding perspex slats brandished with verbal evidence of apartheid's brutality given in court before the TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Commission), alongside newspaper imagery and text.
We love Dexter Dalwood's cool cut-and-paste collages of empty domestic interiors weaving themes of art history, politics, and personal experience in his wonderfully patchworked perspectives.
As households empty across the U.K. with the easing of Covid restrictions, the artist's exhibition at Simon Lee Gallery, running until 8 May 2021, is timely, while reminding us of the supremacy of this space over the past year.
