Judy Kensley McKie - Design New York Wednesday, June 6, 2018 | Phillips

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  • Provenance

    Helander Gallery, Palm Beach, Florida
    Acquired from the above by the present owner

  • Literature

    “Acquisitions and Gifts 1993,” Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin, 1994, p. 164
    “Light & Verity,” Yale Alumni Magazine, February 1998, p. 13
    Kari M. Main, Please Be Seated: Contemporary Studio Seating Furniture, exh. cat., Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, 1999, p. 28, back cover

  • Catalogue Essay

    Judy Kensley McKie unites sculpture and structure in her zoomorphic furniture, reimagining her animal subjects as usable objects with a sense of refined whimsy. For the "Alligator Bench," McKie flattened the back of the highly stylized creature, allowing the form of the animal to dictate that of the bench. While the cartoonishly rendered alligator looks to be laughing rather than attacking, the color of the richly patinated bronze surface is not unlike that of the reptilian predator.

  • Artist Biography

    Judy Kensley McKie

    American • 1944

    Judy Kensley McKie is an American designer best known for her whimsical furniture, which often features animal forms and a combination of woodworking and bronze casting. As McKie’s woodworking career progressed, she moved from carving animals in relief onto the surfaces of cabinets and tables, to carving animals out of the body of the form itself, becoming the arms, legs and back structural supports of her designs, to fully realized animal sculptures incorporated into her designs that appear to be in movement, simultaneously living within the object and among its users.

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Property from a Private Collection, Florida

95

"Alligator Bench"

1992
Patinated bronze.
22 1/8 x 66 1/4 x 16 in. (56.2 x 168.3 x 40.6 cm)
Cast by Mussi Artworks Foundry, Berkeley, California. Number 8 from the edition on 12. Underside incised 8 / 12/© JKM/1992.

Estimate
$30,000 - 50,000 

Sold for $56,250

Contact Specialist
Cordelia Lembo
Head of Department
+1 212 940 1265

Design

New York Auction 6 June 2018