(Montreal 1913–1980 Woodstock, New York)
Untitled, 1957, signed, dated Philip Guston 57, oil on paper on masonite, 63.5 x 88.9 cm, framed

Provenance:
Leo Castelli Gallery, New York
Private Collection, New York, circa 1958
Private Collection, New York, by descent from the above
Acquired from the above by the present owner

In Philip Guston’s oeuvre, abstraction represents a fascinating period that lasted a little more than a decade, stretching from the late 1940s to the early 1960s. He never called himself an abstract expressionist, but he is among the key figures of the New York School, whose members included Mark Rothko, William de Kooning, Franz Kline and Jackson Pollock.

“I really cannot remember this term [abstract expressionist] ever being bandied about at any get-togethers with other artists in that period. Nobody said ‘You, so-and-so the abstract expressionist, you’.” (in: Abstrakter Expressionismus, Cologne 2005, p. 74)

The figurative works of the 1930s and 1940s show Philip Guston working through his private and social experiences, creating a type of image that was new for him. Vertical impasto brush strokes either crossing each other out or crossing over each other, becoming thicker and taking on more intense colours at the heart of the work, make it look like the original figurative subject is hidden under a veil of muted shades.

The present work from 1957, which represents a truly intimate stage in Philip Guston’s oeuvre, attractively illustrates the dramatic contrast between the bright colours dominating the centre and the grey figures that form the background, like smoke or mist.

He described his process of painting as a dialogue with his works, the meaning of which he was only able to access with some difficulty during this period: “For reasons I don’t understand, in the late 1940s and early 1950s I focused on abstract art, despite the fact that I always felt that it had to do with figurative imagery, even though I didn’t fully understand this imagery. And for whatever reason this has never been fully clear to me – and maybe it’s the case that I don’t want it to be clear to me…” (Philip Guston, 1966, in: Abstrakter Expressionismus, Cologne 2005, p. 74)

The works of the late 1950s played a key role in the artist’s career: he began properly to get to grips with questions surrounding the aesthetics of his chosen path, abstract painting. The works of this period are particularly fascinating and represent a new, striking turning point in Philip Guston’s oeuvre. At the end of the 1960s he returned to figurative art for good.

„Guston’s abstractions remain one of the best-kept secrets of that groundbreaking movement”
P. Guston and M. Auping, Philip Guston Retrospective, Fort Worth, Texas, 2003, p. 18