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PROPERTY FROM A PROMINENT BAY AREA COLLECTION
Lot 9W

JULIAN SCHNABEL
(B. 1951)
Mi vida es una cumbre de mentiras
1999

12 May 2021, 13:00 EDT
New York

Sold for US$94,062.50 inc. premium

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JULIAN SCHNABEL (B. 1951)

Mi vida es una cumbre de mentiras
1999

oil, resin and collage on canvas, in artist's frame

78 1/4 by 66 1/2 in.
198.8 by 169 cm.

This work was executed in 1999.

Footnotes

Provenance
Timothy Taylor Gallery, London
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner in 2004


Ever since Julian Schnabel's now iconic paintings utilizing broken crockery shook the art word's preoccupation with minimal and conceptual art in the 1970s, the artist has been a revolutionary force in exploring the possibilities of painting. Setting the standard for the medium in the late 20th century, Schnabel's style is so singular that it is recognizable across the artist's diverse and skillfully audacious bodies of work. The artist alchemically combines two and three dimensionality, the humble and baroque, intimacy and universality, opacity and transparency, harmony and chaos and historical references and contemporary life. His innovative works allow the contradictions and mysteries of the human condition to play across their surfaces and into the eyes and minds of the viewer.

The present lot features several of Schnabel's signature interests. Mi vida es una cumbre de mentiras (1999) uses text of the title as a compositional element, as well as adding a narrative dimension to a painting. The title translates as My life is a mountain peak of lies: a tantalizingly personal, yet vague declaration, which Schnabel revisits from an earlier body of work, Zeus and Duende (1992-1993). The present painting displays the artist's masterful command of his materials and contradiction in the combination of direct, expressive paint handling with glossy resin, stretching to the limits of the canvas and bounded in by a traditionally ornate frame. Mi vida es una cumbre de mentiras is a gripping example of why Schnabel's paintings have been called moving, passionate, raw, controversial and triumphant all at once.

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