One of the leading American artists of the Pop Art Movement of the 1960’s, Tom Wesselmann owes his prestige to his brilliant rendering of classical subjects—nudes, landscapes, still lifes—in a mode fit for a design-oriented audience. Wesselmann portrays his many classical subjects (sometimes juxtaposed) with a focus on flat colors and smooth figures, opting for an aesthetic simplicity that eschews any aspirations of illusion. One can trace Wesselmann’s use of color and figure back to the Fauvist paper works of Henri Matisse, where the emphasis of the piece was equal parts geometry, adjacent color fields, and and subject itself.

Study for Bedroom Painting #2, 1967, continues Wesselmann’s series of Bedroom Paintings that emerged in 1966. In Study for Bedroom Painting #2, 1967, Wesselmann depicts elements of both his previous and later series’ of paintings— including his Great American Nudes, Smokers, Mouths, and Still Lifes. In doing so, he both maintains and prefaces his favorite motifs. Though the present lot is meant to be a prologue to the painting itself, Wesselmann’s piece exhibits several differing visual elements, such as the subject’s hair and the positioning of each object. While the flesh tones of the woman’s face occupy an entire section of the canvas, Wesselmann’s exploration of primary colors is also evident in the present lot: from the vibrant blues of the curtains and blinds to the woman’s vivid blonde hair to the brick red of her lips, Wesselmann proves that he can make even the most conventional chromatic scheme seem alive and fresh. As his classical subjects also glow with an exuberant vigor, Wesselmann shows himself to be a master of brush in Study for Bedroom Painting #2, 1967.