First published on 4 June 2018
Joan Mitchell, Composition, 1969
'Sunflowers are something I feel very intensely. They look so wonderful when they are young and they are so very moving when they are dying.’ – Joan Mitchell
Florence Derieux, Director of Exhibitions, introduces this stunning example from Mitchell’s acclaimed Sunflower series included in Hauser & Wirth’s presentation at Art Basel. At once immediate and intentional, these paintings devour the viewer exploding with substantial shocks of yellow and gold, cradled by expanses of white and complemented by a panoply of hues.
With the poetic inflection that Joan Mitchell’s paintings so often inspire, Phillip Larratt-Smith wrote: ‘Mitchell’s sunflowers are evocations, memories of an unrepeatable moment… The sunflower itself is left behind, consumed in her gestural brush¬work: the image appears as if pulled through her body, and the yellows and oranges are luminous, transformed almost into pure light, pure object-feeling.’
