Untitled - Black; Serigraph on paper; c. 1975; Signed in pencil lower right and numbered 31/100 in pencil lower left; Framed with a white linen liner, black wood frame, and UV conservation glass.
Larry Poons is an abstract artist who was born in Tokyo, Japan on October 1, 1937. He lives and works in the United States, with the majority of his career centered in Boston or New York. His rise to fame occurred when he painted a series of paintings composed of circles and/or ovals placed on brilliantly colored canvas grounds. The structure of the circles/ovals on these paintings was extremely well thought out. This was accomplished through the use of a pencil grid pattern, that was eventually covered by the application of the painted ground; and therefore not visible in the final work. The grids allowed Poons to organize the figures of the paintings in a geometric way, so that even when the grids were covered by paint; the remaining forms conveyed a sense of logic and structure to the viewer. These optical paintings were liked by both critics and collectors, but yet at the height of his success; Poons gave them up in favor of a very loose and painterly approach to his future works. He underwent a transformation and went from a hard edge and optical format structure; to a very lyrical and expressionist painter. It is this later painting style, that he is most known for creating.
Untitled - Purple; Serigraph on paper; c. 1975; Signed in pencil lower right and numbered 31/100 in pencil lower left; Framed with a white linen liner, black wood frame, and UV conservation glass.
To purchase this work or to visit the Art Gallery, CLICK HERE
Robert Scull, the taxi cab tycoon and prominent art collector; was instrumental in the development of Larry Poons' artistic career. Robert Scull (from Painters Painting, 1984 by Emile De Antonio and Mitch Tuchman): "When I met Larry Poons, he was a short-order cook. I said to him, 'Well, how much do you make a week?' He said, 'Twenty-five dollars.' I said, 'What are you talking about? Nobody makes twenty-five dollars anymore.' He said, 'Well, what I mean is, I only work two hours a day, and that gives me enough to...... 'Well,' I said, 'I'll give you eight weeks' worth of salary: I'll buy a painting from you.' And he looked at me very suspiciously, and he said, 'Well, I'm willing to quit my job, but I want the eight weeks in advance, because if you change your mind, I'm out of a job.'"
Untitled - Blue; Serigraph on paper; c. 1975; Signed in pencil lower right and numbered 31/100 in pencil lower left; Framed with a white linen liner, black wood frame, and UV conservation glass.
Larry Poon's most famous paintings in this lyrical expressionistic style were dubbed elephant skin or dried river basin paintings, because of their very thick or poured paint surfaces. Paint was poured onto the canvas in layers and streaks. The effect was a bold expressionist painting that had the feel of thick lava or if the paint were thinned, colored water. Individual pure applied colors could be read just as easily as the blended poured colors; and after intensive application of paint onto a very large un-streached canvas, the resulting paintings were then cropped and sized. Sections of the massive painted canvas were chosen for both their scale, texture, and/or color; and the resulting stretched works could be as small as a foot long, long and narrow, or the size of a billboard.
Untitled - Pink; Serigraph on paper; c. 1975; Signed in pencil lower right and numbered 31/100 in pencil lower left; Framed with a white linen liner, black wood frame, and UV conservation glass.
To purchase this work or to visit the Art Gallery, CLICK HERE
When Larry Poons was asked about how the paint was applied, he responded, "Well, pouring. I've been pouring for about a year now. So, the combination of pouring, muscle... I can get an effect by doing it hard or just laying it down soft, and a lot of it has come from knowing the slight shift in the floor that I'm working on, because gravity does pull the paint around. I've kind of gotten used to this floor; it has taken a while."
In these wonderful works, pictured and offered here for sale; the colors are chosen very carefully and although these are a matched numbered suite, each individual piece reads as a complete work. In the case of the Untitled - Black, both mat and gloss black paint are used to create a wonderful sublime effect. The colors of blue and pink in the work are only seen as small streaks that were not completely obscured by the application of the poured fields of black. Untitled - Purple, Blue, and Pink are much more easier read as to when and how the paint was applied. The fields of color on the ground ebb and flow, and the paint can be seen as being thinned or thick based on the resulting flow rate. The order of the application of the colors can also be determined. These works are some of the finest editioned works on paper created by Poons and showcase his wonderful artistic skill!
No comments:
Post a Comment