Sam Gilliam

(American, 1933-2022)

Untitled, c. 1970

acrylic on beveled edge canvas

signed (verso)

50 x 54 in. (127 x 137.2cm)

Note Innovative abstract colorist Sam Gilliam died last year at the age of 88, leaving an important legacy for contemporary artists. In the 1960s, Gilliam liberated the canvas from the stretcher, manipulating paint over large swathes of loose canvas, which he then draped from the ceiling, tacked to walls or even displayed over saw horses. His paintings took on a sensual quality as they occupied the space of the viewer in new ways, becoming three-dimensional works as they broke through the traditional picture plane.Part of the Color Field School in Washington, D.C., Gilliam was the first Black artist to represent the United States in the Venice Biennale in 1972. While he only rarely addressed the Civil Rights movement or systemic racism overtly in his work, he said in a 2018 interview with The Art Newspaper: “The expressive act of making a mark and hanging it in space is always political. My work is as political as it is formal.” Rather than draped, the canvas of Untitled from the 1970s was stretched by the artist over a beveled edge stretcher, another distinctive method Gilliam employed for bringing the painting’s surface into the viewer’s space in revolutionary ways. The ethereal, almost organic gatherings of color and texture illuminate the beauty chance played in the composition. Areas of intense color play their part, entering the canvas from the top, bottom and sides, while bright spots punctuate clouds of lighter washes of pigment, contributing to an overall feeling of movement and dynamism.Bearing Gilliam’s signature verso, the painting was signed before being stretched, making clear the artist’s working method. Untitled was acquired in 1985 from Jane Haslem Gallery in Washington, D.C. and has been in the present collector’s family for nearly forty years.

Provenance

Jane Haslem Gallery, Washington, D.C.

Private Collection, Maryland (acquired directly from the above in 1985).

Private Estate (by descent in the family).

Lot essay

Innovative abstract colorist Sam Gilliam died last year at the age of 88, leaving an important legacy for contemporary artists. In the 1960s, Gilliam liberated the canvas from the stretcher, manipulating paint over large swathes of loose canvas, which he then draped from the ceiling, tacked to walls or even displayed over saw horses. His paintings took on a sensual quality as they occupied the space of the viewer in new ways, becoming three-dimensional works as they broke through the traditional picture plane.

Part of the Color Field School in Washington, D.C., Gilliam was the first Black artist to represent the United States in the Venice Biennale in 1972. While he only rarely addressed the Civil Rights movement or systemic racism overtly in his work, he said in a 2018 interview with The Art Newspaper: “The expressive act of making a mark and hanging it in space is always political. My work is as political as it is formal.”

Rather than draped, the canvas of Untitled from the 1970s was stretched by the artist over a beveled edge stretcher, another distinctive method Gilliam employed for bringing the painting’s surface into the viewer’s space in revolutionary ways. The ethereal, almost organic gatherings of color and texture illuminate the beauty chance played in the composition. Areas of intense color play their part, entering the canvas from the top, bottom and sides, while bright spots punctuate clouds of lighter washes of pigment, contributing to an overall feeling of movement and dynamism.

Bearing Gilliam’s signature verso, the painting was signed before being stretched, making clear the artist’s working method. Untitled was acquired in 1985 from Jane Haslem Gallery in Washington, D.C. and has been in the present collector’s family for nearly forty years.

Untitled, c. 1970