Milton Avery 1885-1965

Galerie Paule Anglim, San Francisco, California
Ulysses Gallery, New York

Good condition; lined; some craquelure, under UV: 3 inch line of inpainting above left gull, an 8 inch line of horizontal inpainting at lower right edge.
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Milton Avery's individual style combined modernist techniques with figurative subject matter. His work is sometimes compared to that of Henri Matisse, from whom he adapted flat planes of color and the technique of scratching decorative patterns into saturated areas of pigment. Avery often abbreviated his forms and deconstructed the details of his subjects, thereby creating a pictorial narrative through the interaction of contrasting or complementary colors. He selected tones that seem random and unnatural but convey emotion and eliminated color's role of signifying reality. Avery stated "I work on two levels. I try to construct a picture in which shapes, spaces, colors form a set of unique relationships, independent of any subject matter. At the same time I try to capture and translate the excitement and emotion aroused in me by the impact of the original idea" (Contemporary American Painting and Sculpture, 1951, p. 159).

In 1949, at age sixty-four, Avery suffered a massive heart attack, which forced him to leave New York during the winters of 1949 through 1951 to recuperate in Florida. Avery produced relatively few finished oils during his recovery, instead, filling his time with less-stressful activities like writing and drawing.  Marla Price writes "The calligraphic, whimsical tendency of Avery's art blossomed in the monotypes' (and oils) numerous representations of sea birds. Birds had appeared in many of Avery's earlier seascapes, but as minor elements. In the winters in Florida, they became subjects in and of themselves as if Avery, in his weakened condition, was drawn to their energy and soaring powers" (Milton Avery: Works from the 1950's, 1990, p. 3). In Soaring Sea Gulls, Avery afforded only the briefest textural effects for the water and birds.  Three separate color fields define the sky, sea and land and the figurative gulls are suspended in an isolating, protective space.

Avery's health declined in the 1950's, reducing his stamina for work.  During this last decade of his career, fellow artists working in New York became increasingly aware of the bold development in his work, and ultimately, Avery's impact on the development of American Post-War painters and the evolution of color field painting. In 1960, the year of his death, his broad influence was acknowledged with a retrospective exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art under the auspices of the American Federation of the Arts.