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Michelangelo, The Creation of Adam (detail), circa 1508-1512. Sistine Chapel, Vatican City, Image: Scala / Art Resource, NY"My hand tells me what I’m thinking."
—Pablo PicassoExemplifying Bruce Nauman’s preoccupations with theme of the human body throughout his extensive oeuvre, Untitled (from Fifteen Pairs of Hands) is a stunning example of the artist’s acclaimed titular series that featured at the Venice Biennale in 2009. Executed in 1996, the sculpture encapsulates Nauman’s frequent practice of employing his own body in his lifelong investigations of self-exploration and corporeal communication. Timeless in subject matter, the present work personifies the human condition in its disembodiment, both attesting to the power of nonverbal communication and celebrating the foundational tools of artistic creation.
Bruce Nauman, Fifteen Pairs of Hands, 1996. Artwork: © 2021 Bruce Nauman / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York"I used myself as an object...the attempt is to go from the specific to the general. Maybe it's the same kind of way of making a self-portrait, as Rembrandt made a self-portrait, and a lot of other people, making a self-portrait...making an examination of yourself and also making a generalization beyond yourself."
—Bruce NaumanFrom the beginnings of his career, the artist would use his own body throughout his self-referential practice, believing it allowed him to develop a more holistic artistic sensibility. “I think because when you're trying to find something out, it's much easier to do, using yourself,” Nauman expressed. To use somebody else, “You have to make a whole different set of instructions, you have to think about the work: whether it's a performance or having a piece made or something; you have to be able to think about it in a different way. If I have an object fabricated out of steel or something then I have to know, maybe even more, because you have to tell somebody else everything, more than maybe you have to tell yourself.”i
[left] Bruce Nauman, Welcome (Shaking Hands), 1985. Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart, Image: bpk Bildagentur / Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart / Art Resource, NY, Artwork: © 2021 Bruce Nauman / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York [right] Bruce Nauman, For Beginners (all the combinations of the thumb and finger), 2010. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Image: © 2021 Museum Associates / LACMA. Licensed by Art Resource, NY, Artwork: © 2021 Bruce Nauman / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York"I think there is a need to present yourself.
To present yourself through your work is obviously part of being an artist...But artists are always interested in some level of communication."
—Bruce NaumanConceiving the series in the year of the present work’s creation, Nauman depicts pairs of hands united through various formations. In this particular iteration, he portrays two hands joined together that meet at the fingertips in striking detail, which not only highlights an acute sense of tactility but also lends itself to an empathic evocation of personal intimacy. At once delicate and robust, personal and universal, the present cast showcases Nauman’s masterful sculptural handling, emphasizing the musculature of the curved palms and fingers as well as the meticulous creases and wrinkles of the artist’s hand. By displacing the subject from its usual context of the body, Nauman reveals the expressive potential of simple gestures whilst opening up the work to the subjective interpretation and a multiplicity of meanings, materializing his own words: “What is given and what is withheld become the work...I try to make work that leaves options, or is open-ended in some way.”ii
Poster by Bruce Nauman for his exhibition Bruce Nauman: Fifteen Pairs of Hands at Leo Castelli, New York, November 2 – December 14, 1996. Artwork: © 2021 Bruce Nauman / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New YorkFrom Michelangelo to Rodin, Géricault and Courbet to Picasso, the human hand has been the central symbol of artistic creation and communication. Throughout the history of the visual arts, the hand not only revealed an artist’s virtuosity in conveying expression through rendered form, but further became a leitmotif signaling the creative genius of the artist. In Untitled (from Fifteen Pairs of Hands), Nauman simultaneously conjures a lineage of masters in their studies of the human form and its parts and testifies to the hands as the mediator between the mind and the world. In the words of Leonardo da Vinci: “Where the spirit does not work with the hand, there is no art.”iii
![[left] Gustave Courbet, The Desperate Man (Self-Portrait), 1843-1845. Private Collection, Image: HIP / Art Resource, NY [right] Pablo Picasso, Study of a Hand (The Hand of the Artist), 1920. Private Collection, © 2021 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York](https://phillips.vo.llnwd.net/v1/web_dev/lot-component/fig 5 and 6_467d2711-a6b9-4469-8804-89b8f789cde3.png)
[left] Gustave Courbet, The Desperate Man (Self-Portrait), 1843-1845. Private Collection, Image: HIP / Art Resource, NY [right] Pablo Picasso, Study of a Hand (The Hand of the Artist), 1920. Private Collection, © 2021 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
i Bruce Nauman, quoted in Michele de Angelus, “Oral History Interview with Bruce Nauman,” Smithsonian Archives of American Art, Washington, D.C., May 27-30, 1980, transcript.ii Bruce Nauman, quoted in Joan Simon, “Breaking the Silence: An Interview with Bruce Nauman,” Art in America, September 1, 1988, online.
iii Leonardo da Vinci, quoted in Joseph Comyns Carr, Essays on Art, London, 1897, p. 19.
Provenance
Sperone Westwater, New York
Acquired from the above by the present owner in April 1999Exhibited
New York, Leo Castelli, Bruce Nauman: Fifteen Pairs of Hands, November 2 - December 14, 1996 (another example exhibited and illustrated on the exhibition poster)
Sante Fe, James Kelly Contemporary, Art in New Mexico, Part I: Works by Agnes Martin, Bruce Nauman, Susan Rothenberg, Richard Tuttle, July 31 - October 2, 1998
Venice, United States Pavillion at the Giardini della Biennale, Bruce Nauman: Topological Gardens, June 7 - November 22, 2009, pl. 7, p. 174 (another example exhibited and illustrated, p. 119)
Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art, Bruce Nauman: Fifteen Pairs of Hands, March 2011 - January 2012 (another example exhibited)Literature
Peter Plagens, Bruce Nauman: The True Artist, Berlin, 2014, no. 261, p. 277 (another example illustrated)
Property from a Prominent Private Collection
Ο◆40
Untitled (from Fifteen Pairs of Hands)
stamped with the artist's initials, number and date "B.N. 1996 I 2/2" lower right
white bronze, on artist's base
54 1/2 x 12 x 12 in. (138.4 x 30.5 x 30.5 cm)
Executed in 1996, this work is number 2 from an edition of 2 plus 1 artist's proof.
The artist's proof is housed in the permanent collection of the Glenstone Museum, Potomac.
Estimate
$1,000,000 - 1,500,000
Sold for $983,000
Amanda Lo Iacono
New York Head of Department & Head of Auctions
+1 212 940 1278
aloiacono@phillips.com
20th Century & Contemporary Art Evening Sale
New York Auction 17 November 2021
1
Shara Hughes
Inside Outside
Estimate $250,000 - 350,000
Sold for $1,482,000
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2
Jadé Fadojutimi
My Umbrella Has A Nourishing Disguise
Estimate $150,000 - 200,000
Sold for $877,000
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3
Ewa Juszkiewicz
Girl in Blue
Estimate $80,000 - 120,000
Sold for $730,800
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4
Kwesi Botchway
Green Sofa
Estimate $30,000 - 50,000
Sold for $214,200
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5
Titus Kaphar
Fade With Time
Estimate $400,000 - 600,000
Sold for $816,500
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6
David Hammons
Puzzling Times
Estimate $1,000,000 - 1,500,000
Sold for $877,000
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7
Raymond Pettibon
No Title (Let him come...)
Estimate $1,500,000 - 2,000,000
Sold for $3,418,000
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8
Joan Mitchell
Untitled
Estimate $4,000,000 - 6,000,000
Sold for $11,870,000
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9
Georgia O'Keeffe
Crab’s Claw Ginger Hawaii
Estimate $4,000,000 - 6,000,000
Sold for $7,748,000
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10
Alexander Calder
White Moon
Estimate $4,000,000 - 6,000,000
Sold for $4,628,000
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11
Cecily Brown
Untitled
Estimate $3,500,000 - 4,500,000
Sold for $6,140,500
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12
Willem de Kooning
Composition
Estimate $800,000 - 1,200,000
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13
Rudolf Stingel
Untitled
Estimate $1,800,000 - 2,500,000
Sold for $2,692,000
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14
This lot is no longer available.
15
Amy Sherald
Welfare Queen
Estimate $1,200,000 - 1,800,000
Sold for $3,902,000
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16
Francis Bacon
'Pope with Owls'
Estimate $35,000,000 - 45,000,000
Sold for $33,000,000
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17
Luc Tuymans
Wallpaper
Estimate $1,500,000 - 2,000,000
Sold for $1,250,000
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18
Pierre Bonnard
Panier de fruit
Estimate $2,000,000 - 3,000,000
Sold for $4,991,000
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19
Honor Titus
Linden Blvd Jazz Radio
Estimate $30,000 - 50,000
Sold for $163,800
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20
Matthew Wong
Time After Time
Estimate $800,000 - 1,200,000
Sold for $1,482,000
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21
Avery Singer
European Ego Ideal
Estimate $1,500,000 - 2,500,000
Sold for $4,023,000
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22
Mark Tansey
Garden
Estimate $700,000 - 1,000,000
Sold for $2,934,000
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23
KAWS
THE WAY HE KNOWS
Estimate $850,000 - 1,000,000
Sold for $1,542,500
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24
Wassily Kandinsky
Fliessend
Estimate $2,000,000 - 3,000,000
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25
Jean-Michel Basquiat
Untitled (from Famous Negro Athlete Series)
Estimate $750,000 - 1,100,000
Sold for $2,450,000
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26
Peter Saul
Ice Box #3
Estimate $350,000 - 450,000
Sold for $441,000
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27
Jean-Michel Basquiat
Untitled (The Door)
Estimate $6,000,000 - 8,000,000
Sold for $8,549,500
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28
Emily Mae Smith
Feast and Famine
Estimate $200,000 - 300,000
Sold for $1,361,000
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29
Gerhard Richter
Weiß (White)
Estimate $4,000,000 - 6,000,000
Sold for $5,717,000
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30
Robert Ryman
Series #25 (White)
Estimate $1,000,000 - 1,500,000
Sold for $1,421,500
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31
Frank Stella
Double Concentric Square
Estimate $1,500,000 - 2,500,000
Sold for $1,845,000
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32
Carmen Herrera
Amarillo y Negro
Estimate $500,000 - 700,000
Sold for $630,000
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33
Andy Warhol
The Last Supper/Be a Somebody with a Body
Estimate $6,000,000 - 8,000,000
Sold for $6,806,000
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34
Christopher Wool
Blue Fool
Estimate $800,000 - 1,200,000
Sold for $1,179,500
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35
This lot is no longer available.
36
Lynette Yiadom-Boakye
Six PM, Malaga
Estimate $500,000 - 700,000
Sold for $567,000
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37
Mickalene Thomas
Portrait of Qusuquzah #5
Estimate $400,000 - 600,000
Sold for $504,000
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38
Mike Kelley
Memory Ware Flat #3
Estimate $1,000,000 - 1,500,000
Sold for $1,179,500
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39
George Condo
Collision Course
Estimate $1,800,000 - 2,500,000
Sold for $2,450,000
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40
Bruce Nauman
Untitled (from Fifteen Pairs of Hands)
Estimate $1,000,000 - 1,500,000
Sold for $983,000
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41
David Hammons
Untitled
Estimate $1,000,000 - 1,500,000
Sold for $3,660,000
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42
Nicolas Party
Houses
Estimate $400,000 - 600,000
Sold for $1,724,000
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43
Hurvin Anderson
Country Club—Mixed Doubles
Estimate $400,000 - 600,000
Sold for $604,800
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44
Max Ernst
Ohne Titel (les hommes ne le sauront jamais)
Estimate $500,000 - 700,000
Sold for $504,000
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45
Max Ernst
Kachina, le chien de Peggy Guggenheim
Estimate $280,000 - 350,000
Sold for $277,200
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46
Cy Twombly
Untitled
Estimate $600,000 - 800,000
Sold for $786,250
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47
Reggie Burrows Hodges
On the Verge: Green
Estimate $100,000 - 150,000
Sold for $567,000
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48
Max Ernst
Portrait de Ernst Wilhelm Leberecht Tempel
Estimate $200,000 - 300,000
Sold for $176,400
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