Alex KatzVINCENToil on shaped aluminum177.2 by 25.4 by 0.6 cm. 69 3/4 by 10 by 1/4 in.Executed circa 1980

VINCENT

Yellow Tulips <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/collectibles?query=signed&amp;locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">signed</a> print by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Alex+Katz&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Alex Katz</a>, 2014.<ul><li>Alex Katz (American, born 1927).</li><li>15-color silkscreen on 4-ply museum board.</li><li>Signed and numbered.</li><li>Part of an edition of 50.</li></ul> Please note: This item is excluded from complimentary shipping. Shipping quote will be calculated at time of purchase.

Yellow Tulips Signed Print

Alex Katz: Black Dress sculptures, 2018, 9 Cutouts from shaped powder-coated aluminum, printed the same on each side with UV cured archival inks, clear coated, and mounted to 1/4 inch stainless steel base.

Black Dress (cutout edition)

The Whitney Museum "<a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Alex%20Katz&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Alex Katz</a>" opening Area After Party <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=invitation%20card&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">invitation card</a>.<ul><li>After Alex Katz (American, born 1927).</li><li>Published on the occasion for the after-party for the Alex Katz opening at the Whitney Museum, New York, 1986.</li><li>A VIP Area invite with complimentary admission for 2.</li><li>&nbsp;Off-set printed.</li><li>This work is presented unframed.</li></ul> Area opened its doors in September 1983 and virtually overnight became the nexus of one of the most vibrant Downtown art and club scenes in New York. Every six weeks, they transformed the enormous space at 157 Hudson with a different art exhibit &amp; performance theme. Area was the place where A-listers such as Andy Warhol, Francesco Clemente, Julian Schnabel, Madonna, JFK Jr. &amp; many others went to see and be seen: A place where Basquiat DJ'd, while Keith Haring and Andy Warhol produced several installations. Area's wildly creative invitations became the hottest tickets in town and instantly collectible art in and of themselves. Alex Katz is a contemporary American artist renowned for his large-format paintings of landscapes, flowers, and portraits of his wife Ada. Katz’s flattened forms and simplification of detail are trademarks of works such as Gray Day (1992). “We compete for audiences, as artists. I'm competing with the Abstract Expressionist guys. I'll knock ‘em off the wall,” he once remarked. “If you put my work next to an aggressive A.E. painting, I'll eat most of ‘em up. And I want to compete with the kids. I'm there with the kids.” Born on July 24, 1927 in Brooklyn, NY, as a young man, he attended the Cooper Union School of Art and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine. It was here that the artist first began to make plein-air paintings of the Maine landscape. During the mid-1950s, Katz fell into the small circle of artists known as the 10th Street Scene, which included Lois Dodd, Larry Rivers, and Fairfield Porter, among others. Over the following decades, he developed his hallmark style of painting while also experimenting with collage, printmaking, and painted aluminum cutouts. His work has served as a beacon of style to younger generations of artists, including Elizabeth Peyton and Julian Opie. Katz maintains residences in Lincolnville, ME, and New York, NY. Today, his works are included in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Colby College Museum of Art in Waterville, ME, the Albertina Museum in Vienna, and the National Gallery in Washington, D.C., among others.

Alex Katz Whitney Opening Area After Party Invitation

Black Dress - Yi, by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Alex+Katz&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Alex Katz</a>, 2015.<ul><li>Alex Katz (American, born 1927).</li><li>Silkscreen.</li><li>Signed and numbered.</li><li>Part of an edition of 35.</li><li>This work is presented unframed.</li></ul> Please note: This item is excluded from complimentary shipping. Shipping quote will be calculated at time of purchase.

Black Dress - Yi

White Visor <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/collectibles?query=signed&amp;locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">signed</a> print by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Alex+Katz&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Alex Katz</a>, 2003.<ul><li>Alex Katz (American, born 1927).</li><li>Aquatint in colors, on Somerset Velvet paper.</li><li>Hand signed and numbered.</li><li>Part of an edition of 75.</li></ul> Please note: This item is excluded from complimentary shipping. Shipping quote will be calculated at time of purchase.

White Visor Signed Print

Alex Katz: Sunset 9, 2018, oil on board, 6 1/2 by 12 in.

Sunset 9

Blue Hat by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Alex+Katz&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Alex Katz</a>, 2004.<ul><li>Alex Katz (American, born 1927).</li><li>Aquatint in colors, on Somerset Velvet paper.</li><li>Hand-signed and numbered.</li><li>Part of an edition of 75.</li><li>This work is presented unframed.</li></ul> Please note: This item is excluded from complimentary shipping. Shipping quote will be calculated at time of purchase.

Blue Hat

White Roses by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=alex+katz&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Alex Katz</a>, 2014.<ul><li>Alex Katz (American, born 1927).</li><li>Silkscreen.</li><li>Signed and numbered.</li><li>Part of an edition of 50.</li></ul> Please note: This item is excluded from complimentary shipping. Shipping quote will be calculated at time of purchase.

White Roses

Fine Books & Manuscripts, Including Americana

Robert Motherwell, Helen Frankenthaler, Clement Greenberg, Richard Diebenkorn, and others

Robert Motherwell, Helen Frankenthaler, Clement Greenberg, Richard Diebenkorn, and others Archive of letters from Abstract Expressionist artists and critics responding to a graduate student’s questions about Henri Matisse’s influence, 1981-1982 Comprising: Helen Frankenthaler. Typed letter signed ("HF"). 1 page, New York, NY, 28 October 1981 — Clement Greenberg. Typed letter signed ("Clement Greenberg"). 1/2 page, Norwich, NY, 30 October 1981 — Charles Pollock. Autograph letter signed ("CP"). 1 1/2 pages, Paris, France, 4 November 1981, with the original envelope — Alex Katz. Autograph letter signed ("Alex Katz"). 1 page, n.p., 6 November 1981 — James Brooks. Autograph letter signed ("James Brooks"). 1 page on ruled notebook paper, East Hampton, New York, 7 November 1981, with the original envelope — Richard Diebenkorn. Autograph letter signed ("Richard Diebenkorn"). 2 pages on ruled notebook paper, Santa Monica, California, 8 November 1981, with the original envelope — Dore Ashton. Autograph letter signed ("Dore Ashton"), 1 page on the blank margins of the recipient's original letter solicitation, [Cooper Union, New York, NY, 10 November 1981] — Grace Hartigan. Autograph letter signed ("Grace Hartigan"). 1 page, Baltimore, Maryland, 1 January 1982, with the original envelope — Clement Greenberg. Typed letter signed ("Clement Greenberg"). 1/2 page, Norwich, NY, 14 January 1982 — Ray Parker. Autograph letter signed ("Ray Parker"). 4 pages, n.p., 2 February 1982 — Charles Pollock. Autograph letter signed ("CP"). 2 pages, Paris, France, 3 February 1982, with the original envelope — Robert Motherwell. Typed letter signed ("RM"). 2 pages, Greenwich, CT, 4 February 1982, with the original envelope. Overall 8 autograph and 4 typed letters, 17 1/2 pages; minor wear from handling. Helen Frankenthaler, Alex Katz, Clement Greenberg, Richard Diebenkorn, Robert Motherwell, and more on the influence of Henri Matisse. A fascinating archive of letters written in response to a series of questions from a graduate student who was researching the influence of Henri Matisse on Abstract Expressionism. The student describes his research as being, “primarily concerned with the dissemination or infiltration of Matisse’s paintings and ideas on paintings into the American art world from the late 1920’s onwards.” He also specifically asks about books and exhibitions that they read or visited. The questions elicited a wide array of responses, sometimes curt, as with Clement Greenberg's initial response ("You've asked the impossible of me—not only the equivalent of an article, but a researched article.") but oftentimes more generous and verbose. For example, despite his initial refusal, a second letter from Greenberg offered a recommendation for his own small book on Matisse published by Abrams in 1952, and a nod to Matisse’s painting, “Bathers by a River that hung in the Valentine Gallery on & off for several years in the late 30s & early 40s.” In Robert Motherwell’s detailed and wide-ranging response, he describes feeling a “shock of recognition” or “(to put it naively) love and identification at first sight” when he first saw a Matisse painting. It was around 1933, when he was an 18-year-old student at Stanford visiting the Stein collection in Palo Alto (coincidentally, Diebenkorn, who attended Stanford a decade later, also recalls encountering Matisse’s work for the first time during a visit to the Stein collection). He then lists certain books from his library on the painter, including Albert Barnes’ monograph, his full run of Verve, and “a small paperback printed in Moscow, attacking Matisse as a bourgeois.” Motherwell goes on to discuss aspects of his childhood (including his mother’s love of French furniture), how Matisse and Cezanne caused him to confuse Francophilia with a love of modernism, and the success of his 1977 Paris retrospective (“maybe they [the young French painters] felt a ‘shock of recognition’ in reverse”). He also references his impending 1982 show at Knoedler & Company, saying "I am about to exhibit in several weeks, my most recent paintings which are still partly indebted to Matisse, though this will probably not be noticed because they are mainly in black and white." This letter has been cited in critical writing on Motherwell’s art and is reproduced in The Collected Writings of Robert Motherwell (Oxford University Press, 1992). Frankenthaler and Diebenkorn both responded in list form, enumerating either publications or exhibitions, and some specific artworks, they feel may have influenced their work. Diebenkorn offers further analysis: "The works of 1914 to 1918 have been the focus of my engagement with Matisse although I can't think of any moment of his career that I would put in 2nd place." Frankenthaler cites “Clement Greenberg’s beautiful tiny paperback booklet on Matisse written in the early 50’s,” as well as “a rare book… extremely precious, with black and white lithograph-illustrations… of course it was stolen.” Other artists are more evasive, perhaps elucidating more about the tensions at play in the relationship between art historians and their subject than about Matisse. Alex Katz writes: "...as for influence, it is not a matter of fact it is a matter of opinion and your opinion of Matisse's influence upon my work may be as valuable as mine." Grace Hartigan's letter is even more blunt: "It seems to me that art historians and graduate students are lazy. They want the artists to explain the in-explicable. If you want to see the influence of Matisse on the "Abstract Expressionists" — LOOK! Don't expect artists to give their secrets."

View 1 of Lot 1070: (Abstract Expressionism) | An archive of letters by notable abstract expressionists on Henri Matisse’s influence   

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