Frank Auerbach

Marlborough Fine Art, London
Sale, Christie's London, 25th May 1994, lot 128, where acquired by David Bowie

London, Hayward Gallery, Frank Auerbach, 4th May - 2nd July 1978, cat. no.88, illustrated p.66 & 90, with Arts Council tour to Fruit Market Gallery, Edinburgh;
London, Royal Academy, Frank Auerbach: Paintings and Drawings 1954-2001, 15th September - 12th December 2001, cat. no.48, illustrated p.85.

Robert Hughes, Frank Auerbach, Thames and Hudson, London, 1990, p.234, cat. no.126, illustrated pl.126;
William Feaver, Frank Auerbach, Rizzoli, New York, 2009, cat. no.261, illustrated p.266.

Not examined out of the frame. There is some rounding to the edges of the board, thought to in keeping with the artist's materials, but otherwise the board appears sound. There are pinholes apparent in each of the corners of the board, thought to be in keeping with the artist's working method. There are some scattered lines of craquleure apparent to the magenta pigment at the upper edges of the work, with one or two very fine lines apparent elsewhere, including to the tip of the black impasto at the lower left corner and to the brown pigment just above the figure's head. There are one or two tiny losses to the tips of the raised impasto, only visible upon extremely close inspection, and there are some small historical losses to the extreme edges of the board, including all four corners, but most apparent at the upper and lower right corners. Subject to the above, the work appears to be in very good overall condition. Ultraviolet light reveals no obvious signs of fluorescence or retouching. The work is float mounted onto a fabric-covered board and presented in a simple painted wooden frame, held under glass. Please telephone the department on +44 (0) 207 293 6424 if you have any questions regarding the present work.
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'I behave differently with every single model. Everybody who sits for me will tell you how I work, it isn’t true. The way I work with different people who sit for me is the way I work when they’re there' (the Artist in conversation with William Feaver, Frank Auerbach, Rizzoli, New York, 2009, p.230).

From more than four thousand sittings over a period of 26 years, Frank Auerbach produced about eighty paintings and drawings of Estella (Stella) Olive West. There have been none made since 1973. At first he would kneel on the floor with the board propped against a chair, working under electric light and with more paint being applied to the floor than the board: 'It was quite an ordeal, because he would spend hours on something and the next time he came he would scrape the whole lot down. That used to upset me terribly. I wondered what I was doing it all for.' (E.O.W. quoted in John O’Mahony, Surfaces and Depths, The Guardian, 15th September 2001). Auerbach describes that during the first few sittings for a work his painting would be timid and exploratory, before he was eventually able to gain the confidence and vision to instinctively, almost unconsciously, repaint the entire work from top to bottom.

Aged just seventeen, Auerbach made his intentions towards the thirty-two-year-old widow clear by boldly removing the forty odd pins from her carefully arranged hair at the after-party to the production of Peter Ustinov’s ‘House of Regrets’ at the Union Theatre, in which both had acted. He soon moved into her house in Earl’s Court and the sittings began. The close relationship between Artist and sitter provided tension as well as slavish dedication, both of which are clearly legibly in the painted surface. Although the relationship was often fraught and at times explosive, reminiscent of that between Alberto Giacometti and his wife Annette, its longevity and intensity were integral to Auerbach’s laboured process. Indeed the process itself was perhaps an attempt to pin down the poignancy of their relationship, to solidify the liquidity of that experience.

In the early 60s, when Stella had moved to Brentford in West London, Auerbach would occasionally bring Lucian Freud for so called 'Saturday Night Nosh' of roast lamb and cake. Over this decade his paintings would develop a chromatic intensity which grew with the physical thickness of the painted surface. The sculptural surfaces of these works are vibrantly balanced and demonstrate significant restraint, despite their free fluidity, for with only a few short strokes the paint would blend into uncharacteristic uniformity.