NEW YORK, NY.- Taking place on 13-14 November, Phillips’ New York auctions of 20th Century and Contemporary Art will encompass works by the past century’s leading artists, spanning a variety of collecting genres. Led by Jean-Michel Basquiat’s The Ring, the Evening Sale on 14 November will offer 42 lots, featuring an extraordinary group of Modern works, alongside lots by Latin American, Post-War, and Contemporary artists, including Andy Warhol, Norman Rockwell, Carmen Herrera, and Philip Guston. Nearly 80% of the lots in the Evening Sale have never before been sold at auction, presenting collectors with the opportunity to acquire these rare-to-market works. The Day Sale on 13 November will be comprised of 346 lots and, estimated to sell in excess of $33.7 million, it is poised to break the auction house’s record for the highest Day Sale total in company history. The sale will include works by Larry Poons, Robert Motherwell, Josef Albers, Yayoi Kusama, Barbara Kruger, Richard Prince, and George Condo, among others.

Robert Manley and Jean-Paul Engelen, Worldwide Co-Heads of 20th Century & Contemporary Art, said, “Phillips’ November auctions of 20th Century & Contemporary Art are a true reflection of the strategy that we have actively pursued in recent seasons. Highlighting the tremendous breadth and scope of the 20th century’s artistic movements, we are proud to present an extraordinary offering of Modern, Post-War, Contemporary, American, and Latin American art by artists who, just a few years ago, would not have been sold in the same sale. On the heels of MoMA’s highly anticipated reopening, the art world is now reevaluating silos that have come to define the art market and we are eager to break down the barriers that have long separated these collecting categories.”

Evening Sale | 14 November
Leading the auction is Basquiat’s The Ring, executed in 1981. Depicting a boxer in a fighting ring, lifting an arrow or spear above his head and crowned with a halo before a crescent moon, the result is a unique marriage between boxing iconography and symbols of African royalty. Perhaps a reference to the boxing magazine of the same name, The Ring situates its Herculean figure within the pantheon of legendary boxers, including Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali, who were particularly influential during Basquiat’s formative years. The artist admired how these men had fearlessly challenged pervasive social and racial prejudices; they had, literally and figuratively, fought their way to fame and success. By depicting these figures victorious, beneath a crown or halo, and accentuating their race with jet black paint, The Ring canonized the African American heroes of his time. Though it is impossible to be certain of the identity of the central figure in The Ring, its similarities to a later self-portrait lead one to believe that the work might portray Basquiat himself. The work would make a fitting self-portrait, as, by the end of 1981, Basquiat had effectively conquered the art world when the watershed essay “The Radiant Child” was published in Artforum.

Continuing the sale of works from the predominantly Pop Art collection of Miles and Shirley Fiterman, the Evening Sale will include Andy Warhol’s Late Four-Foot Flowers, a superb example from the artist’s Flowers series. One of only five iterations conceived in this impressive four-foot-square scale, the work is one of the most vibrant Flowers of its size, as it radiates bursts of orange, pink, and mauve. With these iconic relics of postmodernism, Warhol positions himself in the art-historical genealogy of painters of flowers, an age-old aesthetic heritage encompassing both Dutch still-lifes and Monet’s water lilies. Turning his back on tradition, however, Warhol is less interested in portraying a realist or abstract representation of blossoms so much as a modern, mechanical reproduction of a representation of them. Late Four-Foot Flowers is a remarkable example from a Pop genius equally concerned with reinvention as he was with replication.

Among the Latin American works to be offered this season is Carmen Herrera’s Amarillo “Uno,” a celebration of harmony and the color yellow as demonstrated through the title of the work. One of the most important works by the artist to come to auction to date, Amarillo “Uno” originates from Herrera’s renowned series of early Estructuras, sculptures based on her paintings which she claimed were “crying out to become sculpture.” This series represents a pivotal moment in the artist’s career, marking the first time she began to transform the geometric abstraction of her paintings into three dimensional sculptures. Soon after initiating the series, the carpenter Herrera hired for the project passed away and the artist was forced to abandon the project, emphasizing the rarity of these early works. This work comes to auction on the heels of the artist’s first outdoor sculpture exhibition which took place at City Hall Park in a show organized by the Public Art Fund this year, featuring later Estructuras comprised of metal.

Hailing from one of Philip Guston’s most celebrated series is Smoking II, a candid self-portrait emblematic of the darkly humorous vulnerability that characterizes work from the artist’s mature period. Painted in shades of pink, scarlet, gray and emerald, and conveying the universal sense of loneliness felt when suffering from insomnia, Smoking II is an intimate portrait of Guston’s own psychological crisis and contemplation of his artistic paralysis. This fleshy and alert figure with Guston’s signature lima bean head—one of the very first he made—lies in bed smoking, staring up at the ceiling. Guston kicked off the series with two paintings, one of which is the present work, which he sold to close associate and fellow artist Grace Hartigan, and the other kept in his own collection until his death. Several of the other works in the series are held in institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Stedelijk Museum, and The Museum of Modern Art. Smoking II is a highlight from A Discerning Vision: Property of An Important Private Collection, a collection of nearly one hundred lots to be offered over the course of Fall 2019 and Spring 2020. Eight lots will be offered in the November Evening Sale, including two by Phillip Guston, as well as examples by Sigmar Polke, Robert Ryman, and Vija Celmins.

Executed in Yoshitomo Nara’s signature style, Little Thinker features an ambiguously gendered child whose eyes are closed in a state of reflection. This theme of meditative and reflective introspection is one of Nara’s most enduring subjects. A frequent pictorial trope of Nara’s, his innocent and youthful protagonists take on the burdens of an older generation, either holding weapons and swearing or, like Little Thinker, engaged in silent meditation. The work draws from Nara’s long list of influences, from Buddhist inner stillness, Japanese popular culture, anime and manga to Renaissance painting and literature then on to graffiti and punk music. Painted at a pivotal moment in the Nara’s career when he returned to Japan in 2000 after 12 years abroad, Little Thinker epitomizes a crucial shift in the artist’s oeuvre that still informs the painter’s work today.

Previously announced highlights from the season include works from the Collection of Florence Knoll Bassett, with Morris Louis’ Singing and Rufino Tamayo’s Cinco Rebanadas de Sandía being offered in the Evening Sale. One of the most influential architects and designers of Post-War America, Ms. Knoll Bassett’s enduring legacy can still be felt today, over six decades after she became president of Knoll, Inc. Comprised of nearly fifty lots in total that are being sold throughout the fall, the collection offered at Phillips includes works of art and design that this visionary of the 20th century chose to surround herself with over the course of her lifetime.

A strong selection of Modern works will also be included in the Evening Sale, with Joan Miró’s Paysan catalan inquiet par le passage d'un vol d'oiseaux leading the group. Unseen for over six decades, the painting was first and last seen in 1953 when shown as a highlight in the artist’s major post-war survey exhibitions at Pierre Matisse Gallery and Galerie Maeght, which served to present his recent work to an international audience. The painting was acquired at the conclusion of the Pierre Matisse show in 1953 and has been held in the same family collection ever since. Also included in the Evening Sale are Pablo Picasso’s Femme assise dans un fauteuil, Alberto Giacometti’s Portrait of G. David Thompson, and Henry Moore’s Family Group.