Lot 16
  • 16

Guy Pène Du Bois

Estimate
200,000 - 300,000 USD
bidding is closed

Description

  • Guy Pène du Bois
  • Suspense
  • signed Guy Pène du Bois (lower left) and titled Suspense twice (on the stretcher)
  • oil on canvas
  • 25 by 30 inches
  • (63.5 by 76.2 cm)
  • Painted in 1946.

Provenance

Kraushaar Galleries, New York
Private collection, New York
Gift to the present owner from the above, 2016

Exhibited

New York, Kraushaar Galleries, Guy Pène du Bois, November-December 1946, no. 3
New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Paintings, December 1946-January 1947, no. 39

Literature

Art News, vol. 45, no. 9, November 1946, p. 55, illustrated
Margaret Breuning, "Du Bois Softens," Art Digest, vol. 21, no. 4, November 15, 1946, p. 13, illustrated
Max Gottschalk, "New York Exhibitions: Du Bois," MKR's Art Outlook, vol. 1, no. 21, November 5, 1946, p. 4, illustrated p. 1

Condition

This work was recently cleaned. The canvas is unlined, there is frame abrasion at edges and scattered minor surface cracking. Under UV: there is inpainting to frame abrasion and a few other scattered pindots of inpainting. An area in the woman's head fluoresces unevenly but appears to be original. The work retains an original Newcomb Macklin frame.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Catalogue Note

In a review of Guy Pène Du Bois' 1946 exhibition at Kraushaar Galleries in New York, in which the present work was shown, Margaret Breuning writes, "Du Bois's vivid pictorial imagination is so admirably supplemented by his high degree of technical skill that it is difficult to single out special items from this showing. Suspense is an admirable example of his ability to produce a dramatic moment with the utmost reticence of emotional expression. Two figures seated at a card table in the foreground become aware of a door opening at the back of the room. The sudden tenseness of their attention is inescapable. There is, moreover, a remarkable sense of spatial depth in the room that increases the effect of isolation of the two women" (as quoted in "Du Bois Softens," Art Digest, vol. 21, no. 4, November 15, 1946, p. 13).