František Kupka

Mrs. Andrew P. Fuller
Sale: Christie's, New York, 10 November 1999, lot 628
Purchased at the above sale

Jiří Hlušička, The Hascoe Collection of Czech Modern Art, Prague, 2004, p. 26, mentioned; p. 193, no. P48, catalogued; p. 181, pl. 167, illustrated

This condition report has been provided by Hamish Dewar Ltd. Fine Art Conservation, 14 Masons Yard, Duke Street, St James's, London SW1Y 6BU. UNCONDITIONAL AND WITHOUT PREJUDICE Structural Condition The canvas is unlined and attached to the original wooden keyed stretcher. There are a number of horizontal lines of lifting paint, mainly on the left hand side of the composition and predominantly within the white pigments. These areas have resulted in several small paint losses. The canvas is slack and there is cockling along the two vertical framing edges. Paint surface The paint surface appears to have the artist's original unvarnished surface. There are some surface stains in the upper right quadrant and running down the right hand side of the composition, and there are some minor surface marks and abrasions throughout the composition. There is some staining within the black square in the lower left, and some slight paint separation within the black square in the lower right but this is stable. Inspection under ultra-violet light does not appear to show evidence of any retouching. Summary The painting therefore appears to be in reasonably good condition and would benefit from the treatment of areas of lifting paint and surface cleaning to remove surface stains and deposits.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Painted in 1954, the present work exemplifies the radical simplification undergone in Kupka's later works, with verticals, composed according to the golden ratio, on a white background. The alternating black and white sections are redolent of piano keys, evoking the persistent influence of music on Kupka's artistic output.

It was not until 1950 that Kupka signed his first contract with an art dealer - Louis Carré - whom he had met through Jacques Villon. In the next year his first exhibition was organised in New York, when 16 works were shown to an American public which proved altogether more favourable than the French.

It was in 1954 - the year of this work's execution - that Kupka participated for the last time in the Salon des Indépendants. Proof that his reputation was beginning to be reassessed came when, in the same year, the critic Geneviève Bonnefoi recognised him as an artist who had been ahead of his time: 'It seems, therefore, that Kupka was one of the first, and most likely the first, at least in Paris, who thought in terms of abstraction and who tried to do what Malevich described - that same year in 1913 in Moscow - as the sensibility of the absence of an object' (Geneviève Bonnefoi, 'Franz Kupka: précurseur et solitaire', in Les Lettres nouvelles, Paris, no. 14, April 1954, pp. 592-597).