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Lot 458
A six large Popeye carton books and together with a volume featuring the best of the Bud Sagendorf stories and Volume 1 of the Roger Langridge reboot by IDW Comics. This is a deluxe six-volume set, now out of print and collecting every Segar Popeye strip from the sailor's first appearances in Thimble Theatre to his solo glory.
![Doyle [Arthur Conan]: The Sherlock Holmes Long Stories, first edition 1929, red cloth boards, dust jacket (torn) and The Comp](https://cdn.globalauctionplatform.com/7f7103ea-d28f-4b5c-8806-af1000b79ff6/2d918906-5318-49c2-9bb1-af2600b1e2cc/468x382.jpg)
![Fox [John]: The Book of Martyrs, containing an account of the sufferings and death of the Protestants in the reign of Queen M](https://cdn.globalauctionplatform.com/7f7103ea-d28f-4b5c-8806-af1000b79ff6/ccfdf2e4-e7a3-4bfe-a342-af2600b1e3ac/468x382.jpg)
![Milne [A.A.]: The House at Pooh Corner, first edition, pink cloth boards; Seven Other Books by the same Author, 'Winnie the P](https://cdn.globalauctionplatform.com/7f7103ea-d28f-4b5c-8806-af1000b79ff6/8851bb74-7cc5-41d2-8dab-af2600b1e61c/468x382.jpg)
Lot 1321
Milne [A.A.]: The House at Pooh Corner, first edition, pink cloth boards; Seven Other Books by the same Author, 'Winnie the Pooh' thirteenth edition, The Christopher Robin Birthday Book, Year in Year Out, Very Young Verses, The King's Breakfast, Prince Rabbit and the Princess Who Could Not Laugh and A Gallery of Children. (8)
Lot 1223
RONALD BUTTERFIELD - SHEFFIELD WORK CARVER Ronald Butterfield was one of the first provincial artists to win a place at the Royal College of Art. Examples of his work can be found in several Sheffield churches including All Saints Stannington, St Matthews Carver Street and St Pauls Norton Lees. He taught wood carving for thirty-one years at evening classes and in 1987 published a book - Wood Carving a Complete Course. An Oak Carving of a Female Torso Naked and Holding a Baby on Her Shoulder, signed R. Butterfield, 36cm; Two Others, a Praying Nun, 27.5cm high and an Abstract Figure, 3.5cm high. (3)
Lot 334
An English engraved German wine glass, circa 1780, drawn trumpet bowl, engraved 'J. Barton Succefs to the Unity', large air tear in the plain tapered stem, conical foot, snapped pontil, 18cm high, bowl 7.1cm diam, foot 7.9cm diamThis is the first 'Succefs To' engraving the we have seen on a Continental wine glass, this clearly demonstrates an active trade importing glass to the UK from the Continental in the late 18th centuryCondition report: minor inclusion to the body of the glass
Lot 970
NORWICH CITY Four away programmes for Cup tie: FA Cup v Scunthorpe United 60/1 and Single sheet v Blackpool 6/3/1963, writing on the front. League Cup v Shrewsbury 60/1 first season on the competition, horizontal creases and scores entered and Workington 64/5, slightly creased. Generally good
Lot 1022
THE SOCCER NEWS 1922/23 Bound volume of Australian magazines / official programmes consisting of Volume 1 No 1-21 & Volume 2 No: 1-25. Published weekly in Sydney. 46 Issues in total including covers. 1922 Issues state ''A Journal devoted to the interests of Soccer Football, and containing the only authorised Lists of Names, Numbers, Colours and Positions of Players'' 1923 issues state ''A Journal devoted to the interests of Soccer, Football, and containing the only authorised Programmes of Matches'' Included are special editions for Australia's first ever full Internationals in New Zealand where they played three test matches against New Zealand in 1922 plus various Friendly games on the tour v Westland, Wanganui, Wellington & Auckland. Also included are the official soccer news programmes for the following International matches but also includes Australian, League, Cup and various other programmes including New South Wales v Australia (22/7/1922), Australian FA Cup Final (Gardiner Cup Final) Granville v West Wallsend (16/9/1922), Granville FA XI v New Zealand (24/5/1923), New South Wales v New Zealand (28/5/1923), Australia v New Zealand (9/6/1923), Australia v New Zealand (16/6/1923), Granville XI v New Zealand (23/6/1923), New South Wales v New Zealand (28/5/1923), Australia v New Zealand (30/6/1923), New South Wales v New Zealand (28/5/1923), Australia v New Zealand (Men's Hockey), 11/8/1923 New South Wales v China (18/8/1923), Australia v China (18/8/1923), Australia v China (25/8/1923), Australia v China (15/9/1923), Australia v China (22/9/1923), Australian FA Cup Final (Gardiner Cup Final) Sydney v Wallsend (24/9/1923), Sydney Metropolis v China (26/9/1923), Australia v China (29/9/1923). Spine split on inside cover. Generally good
Lot 1054
LEEDS UNITED / AUTOGRAPHS A 12 X 8 photo of players celebrating with the First Division trophy at Elland Road following the final game of the 1991/92 season, a 1-0 victory over Norwich City, signed in black marker by 10 players including Strachan, McAllister, Chapman, Lukic and Sterland. Good
Lot 1157
MANCHESTER UNITED / AUTOGRAPHS Seven signed First Day Covers, 6 of which are limited editions, for the Football League Commemorative Series, Manchester United 70th Anniversary, date stamped 28/4/1972. Individually signed by Martin Buchan, Bobby Charlton, George Best, Ian Moore, Frank O'Farrell, Denis Law and Matt Busby. Very good
Lot 1510
HEADINGTON UNITED V COLCHESTER UNITED Programme for the Southern League match at Headington 4/2/1950, in Colchester's last season before entered the League for the first time. Slightly creased and minor wear to the back cover. Plus eight printed pages on The Birth of Heading United Football Club. Generally good
Lot 1547
ASTON VILLA Bound volume of home programmes for 1961/2 season with all first team home matches including the 1961 League Cup Final v Rotherham United, slight horizontal crease and Friendly v Dynamo Kiev and FA Cup Semi-Final, Burnley v Fulham. Many of the programmes are slightly creased and other minor faults. Fair to generally good
Lot 261
RUGBY LEAGUE PHOTOS Over 70 B/W photos of various size covering the career of Berwyn Jones who played for Wakefield Trinity, Bradford Northern and St. Helens from 1964 - 1969 including his first trial match under the name of "Walker" and first match for Wakefield Trinity in 1964. Generally good
Lot 384
ARSENAL Menu for the Shareholders' Luncheon 18/7/2006, being the first event at the new Ashburton Grove Stadium, signed Paul David Testimonial Brochure on the form cover and Celtic match insert and programme for an Audience With Arsene Wenger and David Dein 8/11/2021 at the London Palladium. Good
Lot 18
Five Tibetan prayer bells, of various heights, the first cast with birds to the finial approx 20 cms; (ii) cast with a crown to the finial approx 18 cms; (iii) cast with an elephant to the finial approx 11 cms h; (iv) of simple form without ringer approx 6.5 cms h together with a small incense burner.
Lot 12
GEORG BASELITZ (B. 1938)Er ist es, ich bin es nicht 2018 signed, titled and dated 24. VIII 2018 on the reverse oil on canvas 305.2 by 170 cm. 120 3/16 by 66 15/16 in. Footnotes:ProvenanceGagosian Gallery, London Acquired directly from the above by the present owner in 2018Georg Baselitz with his inimitable style has long been recognised around the globe as one of the greatest painters of the late Twentieth Century. His works adorn the walls of many of the world's most prestigious public and private museums, such as the Tate Gallery in London, the Guggenheim in New York and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, as well as many of Germany's most prestigious art institutions. In 1980, Baselitz represented Germany at the Venice Biennale and took part at the Documenta 5, 6 and 7 in Kassel in 1972, 1977 and 1982. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York was the first to show a comprehensive retrospective of the artist's work in 1995, an exhibition that then travelled widely and in 2007 the Royal Academy of Art in London organized a further significant retrospective. In Er ist es, ich bin es nicht from 2018, an ethereal, weightless human figure is captured mid movement on a staircase, ascending or descending the thinly outlined steps. This large-scale masterpiece focuses on the human body, the atmospheric figure rendered in shimmering golden hues is difficult to approach or perceive. There is nothing in the title to clarify the identity of the figure, but the style in which the work is rendered draws strong parallels to the artist's pivotal Avignon paintings that were featured in the 2015 Biennale di Venezia - a series of eight towering vertical canvases, each containing a single visceral figure. The series was based on Marcel Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase from 1912 – a work, generally considered to be an ending, a departure from painting, but also a new beginning and which Baselitz deems to be stolen from Picasso. Instead of following a prismatic Cubist descent, Baselitz's nude vanishes; feet floating, not fully grounded on the thinly outlined, barely corporeal steps, the head disappearing past the canvas. Throughout his career, Baselitz has incessantly revisited certain motifs and this consistent re-evaluation of subject matter forms an anchor within an oeuvre of constant experimentation.In his 'inverted' paintings, Baselitz intended first to unsettle and confound, then to open our eyes to new ways of viewing the world, to liberate the painting from the limits of immediate comparison to reality. Not simply turning them on their heads, but painting portraits and landscapes upside-down, he aimed to produce images devoid of traditional associations or implications, art which paradoxically utilises elements of the representational while enjoying the freedoms of abstraction: 'I have always seen my paintings as independent from meanings with regard to contents – and also independent from associations that could result from them. If one pursues the logical conclusion of that thought, then it follows that if one needs a tree, a person, or a cow in the picture, but without meaning, without contents, then one simply takes it and turns it upside down. Because that really separates the subject from its associations, that simply has to be believed; it defies an interpretation of the contents' (the artist in: Evelyn Weiss, 'Georg Baselitz in conversation with Evelyn Weiss' in Detlev Gretenkort Ed., Georg Baselitz: Collected Writings and Interviews, London 2010, p. 90). Born as Hans-Georg Kern in 1938 in Deutschbaselitz, the small village from which he later took his working name, Baselitz began painting at a young age. He established himself as something of a rebel during his brief period of study at the Art Academy of East Berlin in 1958, where his refusal to conform to the principles of Social Realism quickly led to his expulsion on the grounds of 'sociopolitical immaturity'. He continued his studies in West Berlin, where he was to immerse himself in the avant-garde and in 1969 he produced his first 'upside-down' painting, the style which would define his career and artistic output.Despite being a contemporary of other great German artists such as Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke and Anselm Kiefer, all part of a generation of artists grappling with Germany's recent history, Baselitz can be viewed as something of an outsider. Curator Michael Auping puts him into context as follows: 'It can be argued that of all of these artists – each of whom can be identified with a signature style of art making – Baselitz has been the most forceful and Promethean, in many senses of the term, in carving out his new space of inquiry and reordering' (Michael Auping, 'Portrait of Resistance' in Alberto Cetti Serbelloni Ed., Georg Baselitz: Paintings 1962-2001, Milan 2002, p. 6). Today he lives and works in Basel, Lake Ammersee (Bavaria), Salzburg and Imperia (Liguria, Italy).For over half a century, Georg Baselitz has challenged the very limits of color, composition and material. Most distinctive is his habit of inversion which we see to great effect in the present work. Er ist es, ich bin es nicht exemplifies Baselitz at his best, a consummate painter in complete control of his medium, constantly challenging what has come before and as so many of his best works, it tests the often-ambiguous boundaries between the figurative and the abstract. As a result, it is a work of art which pushes the limits, a work produced by an artist who is an inveterate explorer of the unknown and the new.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: * AR TP* VAT on imported items at a preferential rate of 5% on Hammer Price and the prevailing rate on Buyer's Premium.AR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.TP Lot will be moved to an offsite storage location (Cadogan Tate, Auction House Services, 241 Acton Lane, London NW10 7NP, UK) and will only be available for collection from this location at the date stated in the catalogue. Please note transfer and storage charges will apply to any lots not collected after 14 calendar days from the auction date.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Lot 14
ROBERT RAUSCHENBERG (1925-2008)Night Walk (Urban Bourbon) 1988 signed and dated 88; dated and numbered 88.194 on the reverseacrylic and silkscreen ink on enamelled aluminium 121.7 by 183.5 cm. 47 15/16 by 72 1/4 in. Footnotes:This work is registered in the archives of the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, New York, under RRF 88.194.ProvenanceGuy Pieters Gallery, Knokke-HeistAcquired directly from the above by the present owner circa 1989Night Walk (Urban Bourbon) from 1988 is a superbly atmospheric example from the celebrated Urban Bourbon series of paintings on metal that Robert Rauschenberg created between 1988 and 1996. Having travelled widely throughout his life, Rauschenberg participated in numerous international ventures and believed in the power of art as a catalyst for positive social change. From 1984 to 1991 he embarked on the ROCI project, the Rauschenberg Overseas Culture Interchange, intended to spark a dialogue and achieve mutual understanding through creative work. The project was an expression of his long-term commitment to human rights and on a trip to Chile in 1984 Rauschenberg visited a copper mine and foundry where he learned from artist Benito Rojo about the potential of tarnishing agents on copper. He liked the metal's warm reflective qualities, explaining that, 'the metal carries the image instead of the opposite way around, where the paint is the image on the surface.' (the artist in: Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac press release, BOREALIS 1988-92, www.ropac.net, 21 September 2021). Between 1985 and 1995 Rauschenberg went on to create fifteen different series of metal paintings including Urban Bourbon, all on varying supports that incorporated brass, aluminium and copper. The images featured in Night Walk (Urban Bourbon) have been taken from this trip to Chile, although much of the subject matter is familiar and appears in the artist's work throughout his career.Rauschenberg didn't want his paintings to be didactic; rather they are a collection of motifs that lead the viewer on their own journey, and are subject to the viewer's own thoughts, perceptions, and feelings. Photography and printmaking were two of his abiding interests, allowing him to document and reflect the countries he visited and the world around him, and the photographs used in his work are taken by the artist – often on his extensive travels. The title of the present work - Night Walk (Urban Bourbon) – alludes to the dark blue and black background that emphasises the silkscreened and somewhat familiar, everyday imagery of a commercial sign, a classical sculpture, the petals of a rose, a row of open windows and the lattice of patio chairs. The stark contrast of the images overlapping, cropped and interspersed with swift gestural brushstrokes, set against the bi-tonal background conjures up the feeling of a walk at dusk or in the night, when familiar shapes appear from and disappear into the shadows and become less recognisable. The Urban Bourbon works are paintings with expressionistic brushwork and silkscreened images on enamelled, mirrored and anodised aluminium. The title may reference an exchange between Rauschenberg and Willem de Kooning, where the latter artist was offered a bottle of Jack Daniel's by the former in exchange for participating in the now legendary Erased de Kooning Drawing (1953). The rhyme of 'urban' and 'bourbon' also reflects Rauschenberg's appreciation of wordplay. Works from the popular series can be found in the collections of some of the world's most esteemed institutions such as The Albertina Museum in Vienna; ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum in Denmark; Fondation Beyeler, Riehen; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Contemporary Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York amongst others.Over the course of his 60-year career, Rauschenberg worked in a wide range of media including painting, sculpture, fabric collage, printmaking, photography and performance, challenging gestural abstract painting at a time where Abstract Expressionism was the dominant creative philosophy in America. Studying at the famed Black Mountain College under the tutelage of Josef Albers, he quickly rose to be one of the most influential and experimental artists of his time, a progenitor of practically every post-war artistic development since Abstract Expressionism and the first American to win the Golden Lion, the top prize at the Venice Biennale in 1964. Today, his works are highly sought after internationally, and Night Walk (Urban Bourbon) incorporates some of the artist's most recognisable and iconic techniques. With its juxtaposition between two different modes of paint application: gestural brushstrokes and mechanically reproduced imagery; the artist bridges the gap between Pop Art and Abstract Expressionism and wonderfully demonstrates his skill and keen eye for how imagery in modern media culture could be propagated, transformed and composed.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ** VAT on imported items at a preferential rate of 5% on Hammer Price and the prevailing rate on Buyer's Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Lot 24
BRIDGET RILEY (B. 1931)Pass 1981 signed and dated '81 on the turnover edge; signed, titled and dated 1981 on the reverse; signed and titled on the stretcher baroil on linen80 by 70.5 cm.31 1/2 by 27 3/4 in.Footnotes:This work is registered in the Bridget Riley studio, London under no. P8012.ProvenanceJuda Rowan Gallery, London (BR 2) Acquired directly from the above by the previous owner in 1986 Thence by descent to the present ownerLiteratureRobert Kudielka, Alexandra Tommasini, Natalia Naish, Bridget Riley: The Complete Paintings, London 2018, vol. 2, no. BR 214, p. 544, illustrated in colourChromatically arresting, visually alluring and completely fresh to the market, Pass from 1981 embodies Bridget Riley's radical investigations into the optical potential of colour and the complexities of illusion and perception. Riley has produced a prolific, compelling, and technically pristine body of work over the course of her extraordinary career; an oeuvre that was in 2019 the subject of a highly lauded retrospective at the National Galleries of Scotland and the Hayward Gallery. Today, her works are held in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., the Tate Gallery in London, and the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice, to name but a few.Hypnotically evading perspectival resolution, the films of colour as seen in this present work recede and advance into illusory space, extending the abstract field of vision beyond the flat picture plane. Such dramatic visual effects anointed Riley as the undisputed spearhead of the Op Art movement. Nevertheless, her preoccupation with the mechanical contingencies of colour, and the sensory and perceptive effects that can be produced through constructing a rational architecture of form in which colour resides, extend Riley's impact and influence on contemporary painting far beyond the confines of a single movement. Maintaining an unparalleled relationship to the formal, 'plastic' concerns of painting inherited from the likes of Seurat, Paul Klee and Piet Mondrian, Riley has developed a pictorial language that is remarkably unique. Riley explains that 'by plastic I mean that which hangs between the cognitive reading of an image and its perception. If one looks at the painting there is clearly a gap between the mythic illusion which one can 'read' and the immediacy of the sensations one experiences through the sense of sight' (the artist in conversation with R. Kudielka, The Artist's Eye: Bridget Riley, London, 1989, p. 13).Pass belongs to a group of works that were inspired by a trip to Egypt that Riley made in the winter of 1979–80. This excursion was to have a lasting effect on the artist, inspiring her work for over a decade. Following this trip, Riley's palette became brighter, bolder, and more intensified. Paul Moorhouse explains, 'During that trip she visited the Nile Valley and the museum at Cairo, and was able to study, at first hand, the tombs of the later Pharaohs in the Valley of the Kings. Riley was astonished by the art she found in these ancient burial sites carved out of rock and located deep in the earth. These sacred places were dedicated to the dead, yet the tomb decoration was a vivid evocation of life and light. Though their creators had used only a limited number of colours - red, blue, yellow, turquoise, green, black and white - the walls of the chambers receded behind images in which could be seen a bustling affirmation of everyday existence. In looking at the art and craft of Ancient Egypt in the Cairo Museum, Riley recognised that the same colours had been used in all aspects of the Egyptians' material lives, from the decorative to the purely functional' (Paul Moorhouse, Bridget Riley, London, 2003, p. 22).In a spectacular rhythm of blue, red, orange, and white, Pass engenders a harmonious structure that is analogous with the relationship between the component parts of a piece of music. This aggregation of high and low tones, of loud and quiet pitches, creates a field of vision that hums with a warm, self-generated glow. For Riley, suspending incongruent colours and polarising frameworks is the essence of aesthetic harmony: 'this could sound like a paradox', she writes, 'but only if one thinks in logical terms. In painting, it seems to me, contrast is the basic relationship. Even that which appears to be harmony is actually a harmony of contrasts, be they spatial, directional, chromatic, tonal, etc.' (Bridget Riley in conversation with Robert Kudielka in Robert Kudielka on Bridget Riley: Essays and interviews 1972-2003, London 2005, p. 96). In the present work, Riley composes a melodic unity through bands of colour that refract and funnel a cacophony of shifting sightlines between its vertical linearity. An exemplary work of pulsating geometry and colour, Riley's Pass is a compelling vision of abstract painting's closeness to human perception.Born in London in 1931; Riley studied at Goldsmiths College from 1949 to 1952, and at the Royal College of Art from 1952 to 1955. Finding notoriety in the 1960's, her prestige and influence on contemporary art remains decisively steadfast, while her extensive body of work continues to garner discussion in a contemporary context. Citing Georges Seurat as a point of reference, Riley's early output of work played with Pointillism and Impressionism to examine the interaction of colour and form to create light and depth. The Pointillist painter had sought to introduce light into the canvas through dots of pure colour, carefully placed either for contrast or harmony to intensify both their individual power and the overall effect. Similarly, Riley developed a mode of painting that employed the repetition of individual colours in geometric patterns and, in the case of this present work, vertical lines. The lines surpass and transcend their own limitations, and work together to achieve a greater luminosity. Cultivating her technique to explore total abstraction, Riley soon came to hone her optical style, creating dizzying canvases where depth and visual stimuli emanated from the delicate positioning of vertical and linear lines. Initially working with a largely monochrome palette, Riley's first solo exhibition at Gallery One in 1962 soon led to a string of international shows early in her career, including exhibiting in the Museum of Modern Art, New York, a solo exhibition in 1966, and prizes such as the AICA Critics Prize and John Moores' Liverpool Open Section in 1963. In 1968 she represented Britain at the Venice Biennale, receiving the International Prize for Painting. It is true to say that Bridget Riley's continued exploration of optics and colour have afforded her the reputation as one of the most internationally recognisable abstract artists today.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Lot 32
ANISH KAPOOR (B. 1954)Red Void 1993 fibreglass and pigment99 by 99 by 91.8 cm. 39 by 39 by 36 1/8 in. This work was executed in 1993. Footnotes:ProvenanceMcClain Gallery, HoustonPrivate Collection, Turkey Acquired directly from the above by the present ownerAnish Kapoor is arguably one of the most influential sculptors of his generation. Perhaps most renowned for his large-scale public sculptures that are both adventures in form and feats of engineering, Kapoor manoeuvres between vastly different scales, across numerous series working with diverse materials including pigment, mirrors, stone, wax, and PVC, exploring both biomorphic and geometric forms with a particular interest in the infinities and possibilities of space. Immersing the viewer in its deep vortex of beguiling, jewelled red, Red Void is a majestic example from the series of wall pigment and fibreglass works that Kapoor began in 1989. Fascinated by primary colour in its raw state, Kapoor first put these pigments to use in the collective work 1000 Names (1979-1985), where he applied liberal swathes of colour to fantastical geometric formations and allowed the granules to accumulate on the floor around the base of the sculptures. In the late 1980s, Kapoor began to apply these pigments to his sculptural voids, initially positioning them on the floor before suspending them upon the wall. Kapoor's wall works of the 1980s and 1990s are considered intimate precursors to his monumental public installations that have brought him worldwide acclaim.With its curved, sensuous form seeming to disappear into infinity, Red Void instils an overpowering, mystical sense of vertigo within the viewer as it projects out into the room. From a side angle, shadow can trick the eye into picturing a convex form, whereas approached straight-on, the bowl envelops the viewer's field of vision. The manipulation of space has been one of Kapoor's primary concerns throughout his career to date, and the artist has sought to investigate the non-material possibilities of emptiness and the potential of the 'void' through his diverse body of work. By cupping the space, it treats the space as an object itself. On space, the artist has remarked: 'You can see it with your eyes. Then you can't see it. Yet you know it. You know it with your body. Your imagination senses it. It's not like air' (the artist in conversation with Donna de Salvo, in Anish Kapoor, London and New York 2009, p. 404). Gazing into the dark, sensual and immaterial voids of these sculptures, infuses the viewer with a direct experience of the void solely through the sensual medium of pure colour. Kapoor's aim with this series of works, is to awaken in the viewer an awareness of immateriality through their own inner experience. In this sense these works are like existential gateways, strange meeting points between the immaterial and material worlds, between the viewer's innate sense of self and of infinity and nothingness. The large cavity in Red Void opens up a view into an un-defined space characterised only by the deep red of the dry pigment; and here one could even believe that the infinite void of the cavity is contained on the other side of the finite space of the wall. Born in Bombay in 1954, to an Iraqi-Jewish mother and a Hindu father, Kapoor has always drawn on the spiritual and mythological heritage of his upbringing. After a brief spell in Israel, he moved to London in 1973 and studied at Hornsey College of Art and the Chelsea School of Art. He first gained critical recognition in the 1980s for his biomorphic sculptures and installations made with materials as varied as, stone, aluminium, and resin, that appeared to challenge gravity, depth, and perception. In 1990 he represented Britain at the 44th Venice Biennale with Void Field, 1989, a grid of rough sandstone blocks each with an enigmatic black hole penetrating its top surface and was subsequently awarded the Premio Duemila for Best Young Artist. A year later in 1991 he was honoured with the Turner Prize. Kapoor's body of art has served and continues to conjure a powerful sense of mysticism. Through his use of illusion, the dizzying power of the sublime and the seductive force of colour, sculptures like Red Void are persuasive in their mythologising of the world, investing it with Romantic mystery and meaning. This present work embarks on a revolutionary path in which the autonomy of pure colour and the exploration of infinite space and the void are celebrated. Today Kapoor's works are held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., Fondazione Prada in Milan, and the Tate Gallery in London, among others.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: * AR TP* VAT on imported items at a preferential rate of 5% on Hammer Price and the prevailing rate on Buyer's Premium.AR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.TP Lot will be moved to an offsite storage location (Cadogan Tate, Auction House Services, 241 Acton Lane, London NW10 7NP, UK) and will only be available for collection from this location at the date stated in the catalogue. Please note transfer and storage charges will apply to any lots not collected after 14 calendar days from the auction date.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
Lot 40
BANKSY (B. 1975)Fallen Angel 2008 signed and inscribed Thanks Simon ☮spray paint on paper 56.3 by 75.5 cm.22 3/16 by 29 3/4 in.This work has been executed in 2008, and on the reverse of a Morons Sepia print.Footnotes:This work has been authenticated by Pest Control Office and will be issued with a new certificate of authenticity.ProvenanceSimon Evans Collection, UK (gift from the artist in 2008)Iconic, instantly recognizable, and scathingly satirical, the work of legendary street artist Banksy continues to shock and entertain today. Banksy's striking, silhouette like visuals, coupled with his sardonic wit has led to one of the most innovative oeuvres in the history of Street Art. Banksy has been one of the leading pioneers of the Street Art movement to have emerged in the last thirty years, a creator of some of the most iconic and beloved public works of art in the world.In 2002, Banksy published a short book entitled Existencialism, which illustrated a selection of his early street art created in various public locations, from the Millenium Bridge in London to the giraffe enclosure at Barcelona Zoo. Amongst the works highlighted in Existencialism, is a graffiti stencilling of a downtrodden and lonesome angel spraypainted onto an inconspicuous door on Old Street. The work from Old Street is a precursor of the present lot Fallen Angel, and in both pieces Banksy's highly stylised and graphic visual language is on full display. Fallen Angel combines all the masterful elements of Banksy's practice in one work – vivid symbolism, an acute awareness of social issues and the dramatic chiaroscuro-like contrasts resulting from the artist's stencilling technique. Much like the original public piece on Old Street which inspired the present work, the lit cigarette, crinkled clothes, and trainers on the individual shows that the Fallen Angel is in fact an ordinary person, not a divine being. This is Banksy's empathetic manner of suggesting that anyone can have a fall from grace. The focus on an angelic figure is a mark of Banksy's highly satirical genius; under Banksy's hand, the figures of cherubs or putti from Renaissance and Baroque art are subverted from symbols of peace, prosperity, and joy to victims of modern poverty and subjects of societal denigration. Banksy deliberately used a heavier application of white spray paint on the head and shoulder of the crouched angel and used a lighter hand on the legs. Viewing the lower half of the scene, the figure almost seems to vanish from the audience's gaze. The dramatic spot lit effect on the subject deepens this atmosphere of undue public judgement. Some art critics draw parallels between the conventional religious iconography found in Fallen Angel and the Christian, Jewish and Islamic reprimanding stories of angels that were ousted from heaven after refusing God's will. However, both Exclamation Rat (Lot 38) and Fallen Angel display undertones of an autobiographical account. These works allude to the artist as an anonymous crusader for equality and social justice.Although most details of Banksy's identity remain a mystery, the story of Fallen Angel provenance provides a first-hand glimpse into the artist's sense of humour. The present work was gifted by the artist to the comedian Simon Evans after including one of Evans' jokes alongside an illustration of the earlier, Old Street version of Fallen Angel in Existencilism. The joke as told on the stage goes 'it is rather ironic... that the favourite drink of the homeless, should be a beer called Tennent's'. Unlike the Old Street version, the present Fallen Angel includes Banksy's signature on the lower right and is inscribed Thanks Simon ☮. The work was also sent with a handwritten note from Banksy, who jokes 'Who said good things come to those who wait? 'Average stencil garbage' is more like it'. This tongue-in-cheek and ironic wit is also evident when the reverse of Fallen Angel is viewed. It is executed on the back of a Morons Sepia print – one of Banksy's most scathing yet commercially popular commentaries on the art world. In Banksy's world, exposing the truth takes precedence to following established social, moral or behavioural codes. Banksy engages with a long art historical tradition of compassionately capturing aspects of life that are often downplayed, forgotten, or censored altogether. The artist follows in the footsteps of Spanish Old Master painter Francisco Goya, whose Black Paintings visually chronicle the artist's criticisms of war and contemporary Spanish society, or American photographer Dorothea Lange who documented the plight of impoverished families during the Great Depression. Armed with his resounding voice, strong visuals and highly contextual narratives in each work, Banksy is one of the most recognizable and sought-after Street artists of the century having completely transformed graffiti culture. His identity, even after more than twenty years, remains gleefully anonymous.This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: ARAR Goods subject to Artists Resale Right Additional Premium.For further information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
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