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Lot Essay
Soulages has always worked in a somewhat ascetic manner. "Painting" he has commented, "is a constant doing without". If his work expresses anything, he claims, it is purely about "time and its relationship to space". Through the medium and application of paint to the surface of the canvas Soulages says that he aims to "trap time within the painting's space". This is done in an intuitive and non-gestural style that he has always restricted to the simplest of colours and of means.
The present work comes from the period in which Soulages was drawing his brushmarks together into an almost calligraphic and sign-like unity. An extreme economy of means is used to pull together in a few sweeping brushstrokes a sense of harmonious tension between the elements of the picture. A dramatic and yet shifting unity is built up between Soulages' marks that seem to speak only of themselves, but each of which are necessary to build a composition whole. The bright yellow-white brushstroke towards the top right of the painting is a favoured device of Soulages and is often the starting point over which the heavier and darker brushstrokes are worked to create a complex yet structured relationship that is only attainable through the painted medium.
The present work comes from the period in which Soulages was drawing his brushmarks together into an almost calligraphic and sign-like unity. An extreme economy of means is used to pull together in a few sweeping brushstrokes a sense of harmonious tension between the elements of the picture. A dramatic and yet shifting unity is built up between Soulages' marks that seem to speak only of themselves, but each of which are necessary to build a composition whole. The bright yellow-white brushstroke towards the top right of the painting is a favoured device of Soulages and is often the starting point over which the heavier and darker brushstrokes are worked to create a complex yet structured relationship that is only attainable through the painted medium.