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Lot Essay
Helen Frankenthaler produced a large and varied body of vibrant works on paper – in ink, crayon, gouache, watercolour, oil, acrylic and pastel - throughout her long and storied career. Aptly described as ‘among her most spontaneous and personal works’ (K. Wilkin, Frankenthaler: Works on Paper 1949-1984, exh. cat., New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, and elsewhere, 1985-1986, p.26) her drawings were almost always produced as autonomous works in their own right. As early as 1967, Frankenthaler was stressing the significance of drawing as well as colour in her work: ‘My conscious interest was more in drawing and the drawing of color than in color alone.’ (quoted in J. Elderfield, Frankenthaler, New York, 1989, p.184.) Indeed, although best known and highly regarded as a colourist, Frankenthaler always emphasized the primacy of drawing in her process: ‘For me, as a picture develops, color always comes out of drawing. I never start out only with color.’ (quoted in Wilkin, op.cit., p.8.) Works on paper were an important part of Frankenthaler’s oeuvre throughout her career. As the artist has noted, ‘Working on paper can even replace working on canvas for me, for periods of time…more and more, paper is painting.’ (quoted in Elderfield, op.cit., p.284.)
This large sheet was drawn in 1994, during a period of around ten years when Frankenthaler produced very few paintings and worked almost exclusively on paper. Speaking on the occasion of an exhibition of her works on paper from the decade of the 1990s, the artist said that ‘I know when I started all these works on paper not too long ago, the first few felt slow and unresolved and then suddenly something clicked and I couldn’t get them out fast enough and I wanted more and more paper. Every so often I’d tear one up and my studio assistant would tremble but that’s the way it goes.’ (‘Interview with Helen Frankenthaler’, T. Marlow, Frankenthaler: On Paper 1990-1999, exh. cat., London, Bernard Jacobson Gallery, 2000, p.7).
In 1974, Frankenthaler began renting a summer house at Shippan Point in Stamford, Connecticut, facing the waters of Long Island Sound, and in 1978 she bought a home there, establishing a second studio. The proximity to the ocean with its ever changing conditions, colours, and tonalities provided a new direction in her work. Indeed, the horizontal format common to much of Frankenthaler’s work, especially those on paper, has often been seen as indicative of a response to her interest in nature and landscape. However, as the artist pointed out in a 1997 interview, ‘Landscape is a loaded question for an abstract painter. When one looks at an abstract horizontal canvas, one more or less consciously perceives nature or a horizon or a view. One is not apt to think of a figurative reference, which is more apt to be vertical.’ (‘A Conversation: Helen Frankenthaler with Julia Brown’, J. Brown, After Mountains and Sea: Frankenthaler 1956-1959, exh. cat., New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 1998, p.33.)
This large sheet was drawn in 1994, during a period of around ten years when Frankenthaler produced very few paintings and worked almost exclusively on paper. Speaking on the occasion of an exhibition of her works on paper from the decade of the 1990s, the artist said that ‘I know when I started all these works on paper not too long ago, the first few felt slow and unresolved and then suddenly something clicked and I couldn’t get them out fast enough and I wanted more and more paper. Every so often I’d tear one up and my studio assistant would tremble but that’s the way it goes.’ (‘Interview with Helen Frankenthaler’, T. Marlow, Frankenthaler: On Paper 1990-1999, exh. cat., London, Bernard Jacobson Gallery, 2000, p.7).
In 1974, Frankenthaler began renting a summer house at Shippan Point in Stamford, Connecticut, facing the waters of Long Island Sound, and in 1978 she bought a home there, establishing a second studio. The proximity to the ocean with its ever changing conditions, colours, and tonalities provided a new direction in her work. Indeed, the horizontal format common to much of Frankenthaler’s work, especially those on paper, has often been seen as indicative of a response to her interest in nature and landscape. However, as the artist pointed out in a 1997 interview, ‘Landscape is a loaded question for an abstract painter. When one looks at an abstract horizontal canvas, one more or less consciously perceives nature or a horizon or a view. One is not apt to think of a figurative reference, which is more apt to be vertical.’ (‘A Conversation: Helen Frankenthaler with Julia Brown’, J. Brown, After Mountains and Sea: Frankenthaler 1956-1959, exh. cat., New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 1998, p.33.)