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"I’ve always been fascinated by abstraction. It’s so mysterious, like an unknown land."
—Gerhard RichterPainted in 1988, Weiß (White) is a lavish exemplar of Gerhard Richter’s meditative engagement with abstraction within his acclaimed painterly practice. Belonging to his canonical Abstraktes Bild series, the present work ebbs and flows through a lushness of white, set against sharp tones of black and grey as subtle pops of pinks, blues, and greens glimmer from underneath the surface, resulting in a shimmering passage of painterly scintillation across the canvas. The colors undulate through the surface with the variance of each layer of paint, exuding an iridescent atmospheric quality through its chromatic life force and textual richness. The present work stands at the crossroads of the artist’s early all-over investigations that characterized the 1980s and the more controlled chance of his single-pull squeegee technique of the early 1990s that marked the mature apex of his celebrated abstract visions. Marking this critical juncture in Richter’s oeuvre, Weiß (White) magnificently delivers the artist’s glimpse of “scenarios, surroundings or landscapes that don’t exist…somewhere you can’t go, something you can’t touch.”i
J.M.W. Turner, Snow Storm: Steam-Boat off a Harbour’s Mouth, 1842. Tate Gallery, London, Image: © Tate, London / Art Resource, NYWidely regarded as a significant contribution to the tradition of painting, Richter’s innovative squeegee technique invites chance to his artistic process, allowing the medium to spontaneously guide his creations as the pigment shifts and spreads under the pressure of contact. He expressed, “With a brush you have control. The paint goes on the brush and you make the mark. From experience you know exactly what will happen. With the squeegee you lose control. Not all control, but some control.”ii The serendipitous effect of the artist’s idiosyncratic process partially removes the artist’s hand from each composition as he pushes the viscous loads of paint across the work’s surface, creating quasi-mechanical palimpsests of richly layered color. “Above all, it’s never blind chance: it’s a chance that’s always planned, but also always surprising,” Richter explained. “I’m often astonished to find how much better chance is than I am.”iii
Gerhard Richter, Snowscape (Blurred), 1966. Private Collection, Image and Artwork: © Gerhard Richter 2021 (0215)"In the case of the abstractions, I get vague notions of pictures that are just asking to be painted. That’s how it starts, but nearly always the result is not at all what
I imagined."
—Gerhard RichterIn his notes from 1974, Richter wrote, “In order to represent all shades of colour that occur in one picture I developed a system that—starting on the basis of the three primary colours and grey—proceed in stages that were always equal and made possible an ever-increasing degree in differentiation.”iv Here, the intimation of a prism revealing hints of yellow, chartreuse green, red and russet brown trickles just below the layered cloaks of white, black, and grey in mesmerizing abandon. Richter’s rhythm of painting gives way to an inherent movement in this lush composition, one that at once suggests the gentle ripples of water and the haze of a snowstorm.
Mark Rothko, Untitled, 1969. Collection Christopher Rothko, Image: Art Resource, NY, Artwork: 1998 © Kate Rothko Prizel & Christopher Rothko / Artists Rights Society (ARS), NYFrom his early color and Old Master-inspired paintings to his later portraits and the still ongoing Abstraktes Bild series, Richter’s key concern throughout the vast oeuvre of his 60-year career has lied in reconciling representation in painting and perception of the mind’s eye. For Richter, figuration and abstraction derive from the same set of guiding principles. “The Abstract Pictures are no less arbitrary than all object-bound representations (based on any old motif, which is supposed to turn into a picture),” he explained. “The only difference is that in these the ‘motif’ evolves only during the process of painting.”v Rising to the surface only through the process of the work’s creation, the alluded subject matter in Weiß (White) refracts color and perception in its symbiotic interplay between darkness and light, absence and presence, ultimately capturing Richter’s famous conviction: “Painting is the making of an analogy for something nonvisual and incomprehensible: giving it form and bringing it within reach.”vi
i Gerhard Richter, quoted in Gerhard Richter: Panorama, exh. cat., Tate, London, 2011, p. 19.
ii Ibid., p. 27.
iii Gerhard Richter, quoted in Hans Ulrich Obrist, ed., Gerhard Richter: The Daily Practice of Paintings. Writings and Interviews 1962-1993, London, 1995, p. 159.
iv Gerhard Richter, quoted in “Gerhard Richter: Notes 1966-1990”, in Gerhard Richter, exh. cat., Tate, London, 1991, p. 111.
v Gerhard Richter, quoted in Hans-Ulrich Obrist, ed., Gerhard Richter: The Daily Practice of Paintings. Writings and Interviews 1962-1993, London, 1995, p. 123.
vi Ibid., p. 99.Provenance
Marian Goodman Gallery, New York
Private Collection, Florida
Phillips, London, October 16, 2013, lot 10
Acquired at the above sale by the present ownerExhibited
Rotterdam, Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Gerhard Richter 1988/89, October 15 – December 3, 1989, n.p. (illustrated, n.p.)
New York, Marian Goodman Gallery, Gerhard Richter: New Paintings, February 2-24, 1990Literature
Gerhard Richter: Werkubersicht / Catalogue Raisonné 1962 – 1993, vol. III, exh. cat., Kunst und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Bonn, 1993, no. 685-1, p. 186 (illustrated, n.p.)
Dietmar Elger, ed., Gerhard Richter: Catalogue Raisonné 1988-1994, vol. 4 (Nos. 652-1 – 805-6), Ostfildern, 2015, no. 685-1, p. 196 (illustrated)Artist Biography
Gerhard Richter
German • 1932
Powerhouse painter Gerhard Richter has been a key player in defining the formal and ideological agenda for painting in contemporary art. His instantaneously recognizable canvases literally and figuratively blur the lines of representation and abstraction. Uninterested in classification, Richter skates between unorthodoxy and realism, much to the delight of institutions and the market alike.
Richter's color palette of potent hues is all substance and "no style," in the artist's own words. From career start in 1962, Richter developed both his photorealist and abstracted languages side-by-side, producing voraciously and evolving his artistic style in short intervals. Richter's illusory paintings find themselves on the walls of the world's most revered museums—for instance, London’s Tate Modern displays the Cage (1) – (6), 2006 paintings that were named after experimental composer John Cage and that inspired the balletic 'Rambert Event' hosted by Phillips Berkeley Square in 2016.
Property of a Distinguished Private Collector
Ο◆29
Weiß (White)
signed, inscribed and dated "685-1 Richter 1988" on the reverse
oil on canvas
44 1/8 x 40 1/8 in. (112.1 x 101.9 cm)
Painted in 1988.
Estimate
$4,000,000 - 6,000,000
Sold for $5,717,000
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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