The collection of Dr. M. Wallace and Mrs. Faega Friedman embodies a standard of excellence in Postwar Art, bringing together diverse artistic perspectives and aesthetic gestures into a unified whole. Led by Kenneth Noland’s seminal Target Painting Ember, the collection charts a course through the period’s most celebrated movements, highlighting the works of Alexander Calder, Ruth Asawa, Robert Motherwell, Richard Diebenkorn and Louise Nevelson in concert with one another. Bringing together Color Field painting and the Bay Area Figurative Movement with their antecedents in Abstract Expressionism, the Friedmans' collection is defined foremost by quality rather than style. Despite the range of artists represented, salient thematic threads emerge among the works, with a dual focus on both established New York artists with more avant-garde West Coast luminaries, as well as an emphasis on color and form at their most elemental, coming to the fore. A testament to the strong vision underlying the group, the Friedman’s acquired important works by female artists, including Ruth Asawa, decades before her ascendance in the market and broader cultural contexts, underscoring the primacy of quality in assembling the collection. An irreplaceable and singular collection that speaks to the best of Postwar Art, Sotheby’s is honored to be offering The Collector’s Eye: Property from the Collection of Dr. M. Wallace and Mrs. Faega Friedman as a highlight of the October 2 Contemporary Curated sale.
"I had used those shapes occasionally, but [...] never confronted them directly. I used them this time because I wanted some sort of image that would hold its presence. An image that I could manipulate, and [...] it's more complicated than that [...] You see, I knew that those shapes had emotional charge for me, but I didn't expect that charge to last as long as it did."
The Museum of Modern Art, New York
© 2020 The Georgia O'Keeffe Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Right: Ellsworth Kelly, Blue and White, 1962
Waltham, Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University
© 2020 Ellsworth Kelly