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"I see color as the presence of everything and the absence of nothing. Without color there is no life."
—Kwesi BotchwayMarking Kwesi Botchway’s auction debut, Green Sofa is an outstanding example of the rising artist’s critically acclaimed practice. Showcasing Botchway’s signature employment of color, Green Sofa captures his unique painterly vocabulary that places him amongst the vital contemporary figurative painters who seek to reframe Black narratives within the art historical canon. In 2020, the present work featured in the artist’s celebrated solo show, Dark Purple is Everything Black, at Gallery 1957 in Accra, Ghana.
Francisco Goya, The Clothed Maja, 1807-1808. Museo del Prado, Madrid, Image: © Museo Nacional del Prado / Art Resource, NY"Botchway forms a new visual language whereby a layering of brushstrokes represents a multiplicity of characters, lifestyles, and perspectives. His new spin on the impressionist movement meditates upon light that is dark, revealing a spectrum of color, energy, and character."
—Katherine FinertyBorn in Nima, a suburb of Accra, Botchway studied at the Ghanatta College of Art and Design with contemporaries and close friends Amoako Boafo and Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe. Currently continuing his studies at the Academy of Visual Arts in Frankfurt, Botchway has virtuosically refined his style in the last decade. Departing from the more photo-realistic character of his earlier figurative works, his more recent work combines his longstanding love for 19th century French Impressionism with African contemporary realism through his self-coined style of “Afro-Impressionism”—further described by the artist as “impressionism from the Black perspective.”i
Édouard Manet, The Reading, 1868. Musée d'Orsay, Paris, Image: © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NYThe visual force of Botchway’s figurations lies in the power of color, evoking the influence of Kerry James Marshall on his work as well as conjuring Amy Sherald’s practice of grayscaling the complexion of her figures. In Botchway’s visual language, the hallmark use of purple to render skin and orange for the eyes is anything but arbitrary. Recalling a rich African cultural history of precious murex purple production, “purple means power,” as Katherine Finerty explained.ii “Purple is an ancient color, a color mostly associated with royals and rulers. That was the kind of space in which I wanted to elevate blackness—a place of spirituality, beauty and royalty,” Botchway elucidates.iii “Their hot eyes...come with a force of intensity and untold stories, witnessed and experienced, which I want my viewers to have a feel of and get connected to.”iv
"I always want my figures to be vibrant, full of confidence and happiness because that’s how I want to see Black people."
—Kwesi BotchwayA critical element in Botchway’s oeuvre, the fashion of his figures is an important complement to their dispositions. On canvas, he visually fuses his subjects’ actual clothing with those sourced from his imagination or from Instagram. “Fashion is like a language, and at the end of the day, when we dress ourselves, we want to feel good,” he explained. The matching colors of the figure’s clothes and furniture is a device similarly seen in his groundbreaking triple self-portrait Metamorphose in July, on which he explains, “I am signifying the instinctive way we change with time, whether we are ready or not. One’s ability to remain true to their core no matter their changing nature.”vi
i Kwesi Botchway, quoted in Stephanie Sporn, “For Ghanaian Portraitist Kwesi Botchway, Fashion and Power Go Hand in Hand,” Galerie, November 13, 2020.
ii Kwesi Botchway, quoted in Katherine Finerty, Kwesi Botchway: Dark Purple is Everything Black, Gallery 1957, 2020, press release.
iii Kwesi Botchway, quoted in “Artist Talk—Dark Purple is Everything Black: Kwesi & Katherine in Conversation,” Gallery 1957, June 25, 2021, IGTV.
iv Kwesi Botchway, quoted in Katherine Finerty, Kwesi Botchway: Dark Purple is Everything Black, Gallery 1957, 2020, press release.
v Kwesi Botchway, quoted in Stephanie Sporn, “For Ghanaian Portraitist Kwesi Botchway, Fashion and Power Go Hand in Hand,” Galerie, November 13, 2020.
vi Kwesi Botchway, quoted in Holly Black, “Kwesi Botchway: “I Wanted Viewers to Appreciate All Different Parts of Me,” Elephant, no. 45, May 7, 2021, online.Provenance
Gallery 1957, Accra
Private Collection
Acquired from the above by the present ownerExhibited
Accra, Gallery 1957, Kwesi Botchway, Dark Purple Is Everything Black, May 19 – June 9, 2020
4
Green Sofa
signed and dated "K. Botchway 20" lower left; further signed and dated "K. Botchway" on the figure's right proper ankle; signed, titled and dated "Kwesi Botchway Green Sofa (2020)" on the reverse
acrylic on canvas
60 1/4 x 55 in. (153 x 139.7 cm)
Painted in 2020.
Estimate
$30,000 - 50,000
Sold for $214,200
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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