.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
"I do not set up abstract painting in opposition to figurative. A painting should be both abstract and figurative: abstract to the extent that it is a flat surface, figurative to the extent that it is a representation of space." (Nicholas de Stal cited in Nicholas de Stal in America, exh. cat., Washington D.C. 1990, p. 22).
Composition 1951 is one of greatest examples from a series of highly textural and seemingly abstract paintings that de Stal painted after visiting an exhibition of Byzantine mosaics from Ravenna. The resultant series explores the tonal, spatial and colour relationships between rectangular forms in the manner of a musical fugue.
Of all of the paintings in this remarkable series, Composition 1951 is the most heavily textured, as well as the one that most fully explores the three-dimensionality and plasticity of the materials. De Stal had first begun to use a palette knife to apply paint at the end of 1949. As Composition 1951 shows, within two years he had clearly mastered the technique to the extent where he was able to sculpt with the knife a shimmering array of colour and texture into a delightfully homgenous composition.
In a work that invites the spectator's eye to wander amidst its labyrinth of detail, form, colour and texture, de Stal creates a visual colour-field that pulsates with both energy and depth and yet is held together like a baroque concerto by a number of surprising rhythms and harmonies.
Composition 1951 is one of greatest examples from a series of highly textural and seemingly abstract paintings that de Stal painted after visiting an exhibition of Byzantine mosaics from Ravenna. The resultant series explores the tonal, spatial and colour relationships between rectangular forms in the manner of a musical fugue.
Of all of the paintings in this remarkable series, Composition 1951 is the most heavily textured, as well as the one that most fully explores the three-dimensionality and plasticity of the materials. De Stal had first begun to use a palette knife to apply paint at the end of 1949. As Composition 1951 shows, within two years he had clearly mastered the technique to the extent where he was able to sculpt with the knife a shimmering array of colour and texture into a delightfully homgenous composition.
In a work that invites the spectator's eye to wander amidst its labyrinth of detail, form, colour and texture, de Stal creates a visual colour-field that pulsates with both energy and depth and yet is held together like a baroque concerto by a number of surprising rhythms and harmonies.