
Christopher Dawson
Head of Department
Sold for £22,750 inc. premium
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Provenance
Private Collection, U.K.
Known for her vast and vibrant canvases brimming with colour, Gillian Ayres was one of the leading abstract painters of the 20th Century. Her lyrical style emanates from every canvas and has enraptured her audiences over the decades. Never didactic or subjective, her work illustrates an artist constantly experimenting with the possibilities and physicalities of paint, often using her hands to create her gestural motifs. To Ayres, her paintings were 'about painting, about shape and colour, not telling stories'. Following no articulated school of thought or style, her work is free from politics and social causes, and gender does not appear to be a theme in her work. However, Ayres, in becoming the first woman to run a fine art department in a British art school when appointed head of painting at Winchester in 1978, was something of a trailblazer for her time. One can therefore see why Angela Carter (see note for Lot 47) may have been compelled to add works by Ayres to her collection.