Frank Auerbach - Modern & Contemporary Art Day Sale London Friday, October 11, 2024 | Phillips
  • “I haven’t painted [Mornington Crescent] to ally myself with some Camden Town Group, but simply because I feel London is this raw thing ... This extraordinary, marvellously unpainted city where whenever somebody tries to get something going, they stop halfway through, and next to it something incongruous occurs ... this higgledy-piggledy mess of a city.” 
    —Frank Auerbach
    The subject matter of Frank Auerbach’s early paintings sees a continual depiction of post-war London, a destroyed city the artist captured through his semi-figurative style, characterised by strong brushstrokes and an impasto effect. Familiar scenes for Auerbach such as Mornington Crescent – the site of his North London studio from 1954 onwards are key subjects for the artist – as he consistently painted a “world full of atmospheric reality: a small corner of London which is his own arena”.i Two Studies are a precursory work to his fully realised painting of the same year, with both works revealing an intimate insight into the everyday scenes of the artist’s life, alongside his practice of using preliminary site sketches as templates for his final paintings. The formal features of Two Studies and the final Morning Crescent painting also showcase the “balance of objective depiction and emotional realism” within his work, with this combination of depicting everyday scenes through expressive brushstrokes being a defining feature of his work.ii
     

     

    i Norman Rosenthal quoted in Frank Auerbach: Paintings and Drawings 1954 – 2001, London, 2001, p.12
    ii Norman Rosenthal quoted in Frank Auerbach: Paintings and Drawings 1954 – 2001, London, 2001, p.12

    • Condition Report

    • Description

      View our Conditions of Sale.

    • Provenance

      Marlborough Gallery, London
      Acquired from the above by the present owner in 2008

166

Two Studies for 'Mornington Crescent - Summer Morning'

black ink, coloured crayon and pencil on paper
upper sheet 20.9 x 23.4 cm (8 1/4 x 9 1/4 in.)
lower sheet 21.2 x 23.4 cm (8 3/8 x 9 1/4 in.)
framed 50.9 x 31.1 cm (20 x 12 1/4 in.)

Executed in 2004.

Full Cataloguing

Estimate
£20,000 - 30,000 

Place Advance Bid
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Simon Tovey
Director, Head of Day Sale, London
+44 7502 428 688
stovey@phillips.com

 

 

Modern & Contemporary Art Day Sale

London Auction 11 October 2024