Armando Reverón - 20th Century & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Morning Session New York Wednesday, May 16, 2018 | Phillips

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  • Provenance

    Acquired directly from the artist by the present owner

  • Exhibited

    Caracas, Centro Venezolano Americano, Armando Reverón Pinturas, November 23 - December 10, 1951
    Caracas, Museo de Bellas Artes, Exposición Retrospectiva de Armando Reverón, July 1955
    Boston, The Institute of Contemporary Art; Washington D.C., The Corcoran Gallery of Art; New Orleans, Isaac Delgado Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts Houston; San Francisco Museum of Art, Armando Reverón, 1956
    Caracas, Instituto Venezolano Italiano de Cultura, Armando Reverón, April 9, 1961

  • Literature

    Juan Calzadilla, Armando Reverón, Caracas, 1979, no. 282, p. 318 (illustrated)
    María Elena Huizi, Armando Reverón, Caracas, 2007, p. 58 (illustrated)

  • Catalogue Essay

    Armando Reverón’s in-depth study of natural light in his renowned white landscapes and his renditions of Venezuela’s industrial ports, made him one of Venezuela’s most important modernists. His studies in Spain under Ignacio Zuloaga and travels in France reflect influences of Francisco Goya, Joaquín Sorolla and the Post-Impressionists.

    During the 1920s and 1930s Armando Reverón was already painting the coastal Caribbean scenery of iridescent white and sepia colors. Experimenting with non-traditional canvases, Reverón employed burlap and paper bags, producing a raw texture emulating the visual quality of blinding light. The present lot, Calle del puerto, painted circa 1942, is representative of his iconic modernist style, and perhaps the first artistic portrayals of Venezuela’s increasingly prosperous industrial activity. His depictions of the port and streets of La Guaira would add a degree of perspectival exactitude not present in many of his other works. Precise, darkly rendered lines give the composition an industrial feel, yet the human activity taking place in the town is somewhat undecipherable, a result of Reverón often painting from a distance in a dinghy with loose gestural brushstrokes. Reverón incorporates more color in this expressionist composition, adding blues, ochre and grey, juxtaposed with a characteristic sepia and white. By the 1940s Reverón was regularly exhibiting his work. In fact, Calle del puerto was exhibited extensively in Venezuela and in the important 1956 traveling exhibition Armando Reverón, that started at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston and ended in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Reverón continued to depict different scenes of La Guaira until 1945, closing the last period of landscapes he would ever paint.

  • Artist Biography

    Armando Reverón

    Venezuelan • 1889 - 1954

    Armando Reverón was born into a wealthy Venezuelan family where he found an early interest in art, studying in Caracas and Spain under Ignacio Zuloaga. Upon his return to Venezuela he was diagnosed with schizophrenia, causing him to retreat to the coastal village of Macuto with his lifelong partner, Juanita.

    Often depicting landscapes and nudes, Reverón developed a singular painting technique utilizing a highly textured monochromatic white palette. Many of his works also feature touches of blue, gray, aquamarine and occasional areas of bare canvas. This color scheme emulates the blinding luminosity of light one would experience on the beaches of Venezuela. Reverón worked in isolation and made most of his painting supplies himself, including brushes, canvases and coconut tree frames.

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115

Calle del puerto

oil on canvas
30 5/8 x 40 7/8 in. (77.8 x 103.8 cm.)
Painted circa 1942.

Please note this work will be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist edited by Proyecto Armando Reverón (PAR).

Estimate
$200,000 - 300,000 

Sold for $250,000

Contact Specialist
John McCord
Head of Day Sale, Morning Session
New York
+1 212 940 1261
jmccord@phillips.com

20th Century & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Morning Session

New York Auction 16 May 2018