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Lot Essay
We are very grateful to Andrea Rose for her assistance in cataloguing this lot.
Painted in 1980, Fidelma Asleep is a poignant portrait of Fidelma Kavanagh, one of Leon Kossoff's most significant and prolific models, who sat for the artist regularly over a period of thirty-five years. Kossoff's artistic approach relied heavily on this prolonged familiarity, as he focused on capturing an intuitive sense of physicality of his sitter rather than an exact likeness. Aside from his family members, Fidelma was Kossoff's longest-serving model. Reflecting upon their artistic relationship, Kossoff praised her, stating: ‘She’s extraordinary. With Fidelma, it’s straightforward. There’s no nonsense … and she’s done it for years and years’ (quoted in A. Rose, Leon Kossoff: Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, London, 2021, p. 286).
Fidelma is portrayed reclining in her chair, asleep, her head leaning back and away from the artist, with her arms resting at her sides. The use of thick impasto integrates Fidelma’s figure with her surroundings, as the boundaries of her form merge fluidly into the surrounding space. Her body is accentuated by lighter tones, while the shadows defining her features are rendered in deeper shades of brown. Kossoff employs the textured impasto to shape the composition, with the grooves delineating both Fidelma’s figure and the environment. Here, Kossoff captures a rare moment of stillness and repose, resulting in an intimate and tender depiction. As Kossoff’s figure painting developed during the 1980s, his work adopted a more nuanced sensibility, Paul Moorhouse observing how ‘A new tenderness is apparent in the quality of the drawing that caresses the figure, emphasising its nakedness, angularity, softness, and vulnerability. Kossoff’s use of line divides the image into broad areas of colour—pale flesh and sienna—that convey a sense of intimacy and introspection ... The model, in moments of unselfconsciousness, reveals something more intimate and unforced. Kossoff’s depictions capture these unguarded moments, vividly recreating an acute, unidealised, and physical sense of presence’ (P. Moorhouse, exhibition catalogue, Leon Kossoff, London, Tate Gallery, 1996, pp. 23-24). Fidelma Asleep not only speaks to the complexities of Kossoff’s figurative painting but also to the importance of his models in his work, and the relationships and environments that surrounded and influenced him.
Painted in 1980, Fidelma Asleep is a poignant portrait of Fidelma Kavanagh, one of Leon Kossoff's most significant and prolific models, who sat for the artist regularly over a period of thirty-five years. Kossoff's artistic approach relied heavily on this prolonged familiarity, as he focused on capturing an intuitive sense of physicality of his sitter rather than an exact likeness. Aside from his family members, Fidelma was Kossoff's longest-serving model. Reflecting upon their artistic relationship, Kossoff praised her, stating: ‘She’s extraordinary. With Fidelma, it’s straightforward. There’s no nonsense … and she’s done it for years and years’ (quoted in A. Rose, Leon Kossoff: Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, London, 2021, p. 286).
Fidelma is portrayed reclining in her chair, asleep, her head leaning back and away from the artist, with her arms resting at her sides. The use of thick impasto integrates Fidelma’s figure with her surroundings, as the boundaries of her form merge fluidly into the surrounding space. Her body is accentuated by lighter tones, while the shadows defining her features are rendered in deeper shades of brown. Kossoff employs the textured impasto to shape the composition, with the grooves delineating both Fidelma’s figure and the environment. Here, Kossoff captures a rare moment of stillness and repose, resulting in an intimate and tender depiction. As Kossoff’s figure painting developed during the 1980s, his work adopted a more nuanced sensibility, Paul Moorhouse observing how ‘A new tenderness is apparent in the quality of the drawing that caresses the figure, emphasising its nakedness, angularity, softness, and vulnerability. Kossoff’s use of line divides the image into broad areas of colour—pale flesh and sienna—that convey a sense of intimacy and introspection ... The model, in moments of unselfconsciousness, reveals something more intimate and unforced. Kossoff’s depictions capture these unguarded moments, vividly recreating an acute, unidealised, and physical sense of presence’ (P. Moorhouse, exhibition catalogue, Leon Kossoff, London, Tate Gallery, 1996, pp. 23-24). Fidelma Asleep not only speaks to the complexities of Kossoff’s figurative painting but also to the importance of his models in his work, and the relationships and environments that surrounded and influenced him.