PROPERTY FROM A PROMINENT BAY AREA COLLECTION
Lot 32
BETTY WOODMAN(1930-2018)Kachina
1984
1984
12 May 2021, 13:00 EDT
New YorkSold for US$37,812.50 inc. premium
Looking for a similar item?
Our Post-War and Contemporary Art specialists can help you find a similar item at an auction or via a private sale.
Find your local specialistAsk about this lot
Client Services (New York)
Client Services (Los Angeles)
Client Services (San Francisco)
BETTY WOODMAN (1930-2018)
Kachina
1984
stamped WOODMAN
glazed ceramic
32 by 20 1/4 by 8 1/4 in.
81.2 by 51.4 by 20.9 cm.
This work was executed in 1984.
1984
stamped WOODMAN
glazed ceramic
32 by 20 1/4 by 8 1/4 in.
81.2 by 51.4 by 20.9 cm.
This work was executed in 1984.
Footnotes
Provenance
Sale: Butterfields, Los Angeles, Modern, Contemporary & Latin American Art, 23 October 1997, Lot 6662
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner
Betty Woodman is considered to be one of the most singular American artists of the 20th Century, renowned for her pioneering exploration of painting, sculpture and, most notably, ceramics. Spanning an almost 70 year period, Woodman's ceramic practice evolved and grew from functional pottery to magnificent works of Contemporary Art. Woodman began her practice at the School for American Craftsmen in Alfred, New York from 1948-1950. She continued her studies in Italy in 1951, returning to the country many times throughout the 1950s and 1960s while expanding her practice. This exposure to Italian traditions in ceramics greatly inspired her to explore new and different techniques in her work, and she continued to work from Italy for a portion of each year for the rest of her career.
Woodman's work first began to gain recognition in the 1970s. However it was only after Woodman and her husband, fellow artist George Woodman, purchased a New York loft in 1980, that she began to show her work in fine art galleries and present them as works of Contemporary Art. As her work evolved, Woodman transformed her pottery into new inventive shapes with imaginative colors. Her pieces were always based on a functional form, but her later work became more experimental and vivid, often abandoning the initial function of the piece. Despite this seemingly dramatic shift in her output, every piece by the artist is baroque and expressive, marking it as an identifiable Woodman work.
Woodman was the subject of a 2006 retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Her work can be found in the permanent collections of the world's most celebrated museums including the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Brooklyn Museum; Denver Art Museum; Detroit Art Institute; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Museum of Modern Art, New York; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Japan; Philadelphia Museum of Art; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Victoria and Albert Museum, London and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.
