Palm Desert Gallery Walkthrough with Tom Venditti – 2022/2023 Season

PUBLISHED IN: Gallery Tours

Join Heather James Fine Art Director, Tom Venditti, as he tours our flagship gallery in Palm Desert, California. We feel fortunate to have Tom. Prior to joining Heather James Fine Art, Tom spent 14 years as the Senior Director of Art for the breathtaking Paul Allen Collection, which recently set several new records at auction in a triumphant display of the art market’s strength.

Heather James Fine Art endeavors to offer a wide selection of art of historical significance and aesthetic appeal and we can think of no one more capable of providing insights into a Claude Monet while seamlessly offering an informed perspective on a fabulous, new arrival by Wayne Thiebaud. We hope you enjoy Tom’s curated journey across several genres and blue-chip artists and that it will inform you and inspire a visit to our Palm Desert location to view the collection in person.

We are pleased to announce our winter hours at our Palm Desert location at 455188 Portola Avenue: Monday through Saturday from 9:00 – 5:00.

ARTWORK CURRENTLY ON VIEW AT HEATHER JAMES PALM DESERT

According to the catalogue raisonné compiled by The Brandywine River Museum of Art, the preliminary drawing for Puritan Cod Fishers was completed by N. C Wyeth prior to his death in October 1945. The entry records an image of the sketch as well as the artist’s inscriptions and its title, Puritan Cod Fishers, characterized by the catalogue as ‘alternate’. In either case, the large-scale canvas is a unique work that Andrew Wyeth later recalled was painted solely by his hand, a demarcated collaboration of the father’s design and composition brought to fruition by a remarkable son’s execution. For Andrew, it must have been a deeply felt and emotional experience. Given his father’s attention to detail and authenticity, the lines of the small sailing craft represent a shallot, in use during the sixteenth century. On the other hand, Andrew likely deepened the hues of the restless sea more so than his father might have, a choice that appropriately heightens the perilous nature of the task.

Andrew Wyeth & N. C. Wyeth

N.C. Wyeth’s extraordinary skills as an illustrator were borne of impeccable draftsmanship and as a painter, his warmly rich, harmonious sense of color, and ability to capture the quality of light itself. But it is his unmatched artistry in vivifying story and character with a powerful sense of mood that we admire most of all — the ability to transport himself to the world and time of his creation and to convey it with a beguiling sense of conviction. That ability is as apparent in the compositional complexities of Treasure Island’s “One More Step, Mr. Hands!” as it is here, in the summary account of a square-rigged, seventeenth-century merchant ship tossed upon the seas. The Coming of the Mayflower in 1620 is a simple statement of observable facts, yet Wyeth’s impeccable genius as an illustrator imbues it with the bracing salt air and taste that captures the adventuresome spirit of the men and women who are largely credited with the founding of America. That spirit is carried on the wind and tautly billowed sails, the jaunty heeling of the ship at the nose of a stiff gale, the thrusting, streamed-limned clouds, and the gulls jauntily arranged to celebrate an arrival as they are the feathered angels of providence guiding it to safe harbor. <br> <br>The Coming of the Mayflower in 1620 was based on two studies, a composition drawing in graphite and a small presentation painting. The finished mural appears to have been installed in 1941.

N.C. WYETH

During the early 1870s, Winslow Homer frequently painted scenes of country living near a small farm hamlet renowned for generations for its remarkable stands of wheat, situated between the Hudson River and the Catskills in New York state. Today Hurley is far more famous for inspiring one of Homer’s greatest works, Snap the Whip painted the summer of 1872. Among the many other paintings inspired by the region, Girl Standing in the Wheatfield is rich in sentiment, but not over sentimentalized. It directly relates to an 1866 study painted in France entitled, In the Wheatfields, and another, painted the following year after he returned to America. But Homer would have undoubtedly been most proud of this one. It is a portrait, a costume study, a genre painting in the great tradition of European pastoral painting, and a dramatically backlit, atmospheric tour de force steeped in the quickly fading gloaming hour light buoyed with lambent, flowery notes and wheat spike touches. In 1874, Homer sent four paintings to the National Academy of Design exhibition. One was titled, “Girl”. Might it not be this one?

WINSLOW HOMER

It is not difficult to grasp how Robert Indiana’s brilliant two-row arrangement of four letters came to help empower a movement during the 1960s. Its origin emerged from deeply felt exposure to religion and from friend and mentor Ellsworth Kelly, whose hard-edged style and sensuous, unaccented color made a lasting impression. But as Indiana exclaimed, it was a moment of kismet that just happened when “LOVE bit me!” and the design came to him sharp and focused. Indiana, of course, put the design through many paces, and then the logo began to sprout up everywhere. The message, best conveyed in sculpture, stands in cities worldwide and has been translated into several languages, not least of which, is its Italian iteration, “Amor” with its fortuitous “O” also tilted to the right. But rather than being kicked by the foot of the “L”, this version lends a beautifully staged teetering effect to the “A” above. It gives a new, but no less profound, impression of love and its emotionally charged nature. In either case, Love’s tilted “O” imparts instability to an otherwise stable design, a profound projection of Indiana’s implicit critique of “the often-hollow sentimentality associated with the word, metaphorically suggesting unrequited longing and disappointment rather than saccharine affection” (Robert Indiana’s Best: A Mini Retrospective, New York Times, May 24, 2018). Repetition, of course has a nasty habit of dampening our appreciation for the genius of simplicity and, groundbreaking design. Late in life, Indiana lamented that “it was a marvelous idea, but also terrible mistake. It became too popular. And there are people who don’t like popularity.” But we, denizens of a world fraught with divisiveness and caught in turmoil, thank you. “Love” and its many versions are strong reminders of our capacity for love, and that is our best everlasting hope for a better future.

ROBERT INDIANA

JULIAN SCHNABEL - Untitled - oil and wax on tarp - 120 x 96 in.

JULIAN SCHNABEL

<div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Camille Claudel's life story reflects an era when societal constraints often dimmed the brilliance of women; their genius was viewed as a threat to the male-dominated world. Most introductions to Claudel are steeped in misleading biographical details related to her as Rodin's assistant, mistress, or lover, associations that diminish her achievements as a first-rate sculptor whose work borrows little from Rodin in style or subject matter. Despite these challenges, Claudel's legacy has endured, celebrated through exhibitions, biographies, and films since her rediscovery in 1982. </font></div> <br> <br><div> </div> <br> <br><div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black><em>“La Vague (The Wave),”</em> a remarkable sculpture of three women frolicking joyfully, embodies Claudel's passion for art and connection to nature. The women, their hair unruly like the sea, are depicted in a moment of freedom and abandon, yet the looming wave hints at the inevitable sorrow to come—a metaphor for Claudel's life, shadowed by fate. This piece, initially shown in plaster and later cast in bronze with an onyx marble wave, draws direct inspiration from Hokusai's <em>“The Great Wave,”</em> reflecting the Parisian fascination with Japanese art at the time. While <em>“La Vague”</em> showcases Claudel's technical mastery and the influence of Japanese aesthetics, it also poignantly symbolizes her acceptance of the overpowering forces of nature and the tragic course her life would ultimately take. This bronze, cast in 1997, is one of only two not held in a museum, further emphasizing the rarity of and reverence for Claudel's work.</font></div>

CAMILLE CLAUDEL

In "Nude Descending a Staircase No. 2", Mel Ramos playfully intertwines the legacy of Marcel Duchamp's modernist masterpiece with the vibrant aesthetics of Pop Art, crafting a clever and visually stimulating reinterpretation. By associating Duchamp's abstract motion with his signature pin-up style, Ramos creates a dynamic dialogue between the revered traditions of fine art and the bold, graphic qualities of commercial imagery. This work exemplifies Ramos's skill in navigating art history and contemporary culture, using the allure of female nudity to explore and satirize societal obsessions with beauty, desire, and commodification. In doing so, Ramos's piece becomes a quintessential Pop Art concoction, reveling in its playful association with Duchamp while simultaneously critiquing and celebrating the visual culture of its time.

MEL RAMOS

Théo van Rysselberghe’s Portrait de Sylvie Lacombe, painted in 1906, is a classic masterwork by one of the most refined and consistent portrait painters of his time. The color is harmonious, the brushwork vigorous and tailored to its material task, her body and countenance true and revealing. The sitter is the daughter of his good friend, the painter Georges Lacombe, who shared a close association with Gauguin, and was a member of Les Nabis with artists Bonnard, Denis, and Vuillard, among others. We now know about Sylvie Lacombe because Van Rysselberghe is so skilled at rendering subtle facial expressions and through careful observation and attention to detail, provided insights into her inner world. He has chosen a direct gaze, her eyes to yours, an inescapable covenant between subject and viewer regardless of our physical relationship to the painting. Van Rysselberghe had largely abandoned the Pointillist technique when he painted this portrait. But he continued to apply color theory guidelines by using tints of red — pinks and mauves — against greens to create a harmonious ameliorated palette of complementary colors to which he added a strong accent to draw the eye – an intensely saturated, red bow asymmetrically laid to the side of her head.

THÉO VAN RYSSELBERGHE

A major figure in both the Abstract Expressionist and American Figurative Expressionist movements of the 1940s and 1950s, Elaine de Kooning's prolific output defied singular categorization. Her versatile styles explored the spectrum of realism to abstraction, resulting in a career characterized by intense expression and artistic boundary-pushing. A striking example of de Kooning's explosive creativity is Untitled (Totem Pole), an extremely rare sculptural painting by the artist that showcases her command of color.  <br> <br>She created this piece around 1960, the same period as her well-known bullfight paintings. She left New York in 1957 to begin teaching at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, and from there would visit Ciudad Juárez, where she observed the bullfights that inspired her work. An avid traveler, de Kooning drew inspiration from various sources, resulting in a diverse and experimental body of work.

ELAINE DE KOONING

Mel Ramos is best known for his paintings of superheroes and female nudes juxtaposed with pop culture imagery. Many of the subjects in his paintings emerge from iconic brands or cultural touchstones like Chiquita bananas, M&M bags, or Snickers. In these works, visual delight is combined with suggested edible and commercial indulgence. <br> <br>Leta and the Hill Myna diverges from some of Ramos’ other nudes. Here Ramos depicts his wife, whom he spoke of as his greatest muse. Like his works depicting superheroes, Leta and the Hill Myna is imbued with mythos and lore. Myna birds are native to South Asia where some are taught to speak, often to recite religious. Furthermore, playing on his wife’s name and the avian theme, Ramos is referencing the famous tale of Leda and the Swan in which Zeus embodies a bird to rape Leda. The story has been reinterpreted throughout history, including by great artists such as Paul Cezanne, Cy Twombly and Fernando Botero. With this depiction, Ramos places himself in that same art historical lineage.

MEL RAMOS

HERB ALPERT - Arrowhead - bronze - 201 x 48 x 48 in.

HERB ALPERT

<div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Standing at an impressive 103 inches, this elegantly spare “Sonambient” sculpture by Harry Bertoia allows us to marvel at one of the finest artisans of his generation. This piece, the tallest in the series currently available here at Heather James Fine Art, features a precise arrangement of 36 slender tines in a 6 x 6 grid. This arrangement's uniformity and symmetry are visually captivating and crucial for the sculpture's acoustic properties. The rods, austere and uncapped by finials, have an aged patina with copper undertones, suggesting Bertoia's use of copper or a similar alloy known for its resonant qualities and distinctive coloration. Given the outstanding length of these rods, the attachment method is particularly noteworthy. Bertoia meticulously inserted each rod into individual holes in the base plate using precision drilling and securing techniques such as welding that ensured the rods were firmly anchored and stable, maintaining the structural integrity essential for consistent acoustic performance.</font></div> <br> <br><div> </div> <br> <br><div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Beyond his uncompromising nature, Bertoia's work draws significant inspiration from natural elements. This sculpture's tall, slender rods evoke images of reeds or tall grasses swaying gently in the wind. This dynamic interaction between the sculpture and its environment mirrors the movement of plants, creating an immersive, naturalistic experience. Yet when activated or moved by air currents, the rods of this monumental work initiate metallic undertones that confirm its materiality without betraying its profound connection to the natural world.</font></div> <br> <br><div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Integrating technical precision and natural inspiration depends on exacting construction that ensures durability and acoustic consistency, while its kinetic and auditory nature imbues the piece with a sense of vitality. This fusion invites viewers to engage with the sculpture on multiple sensory levels, appreciating its robust craftsmanship and evocative, naturalistic qualities. Bertoia's ability to blend these elements results in a work that is both a technical marvel and a tribute to the beauty of the natural world.</font></div>

HARRY BERTOIA

Francisco Zúñiga created sculpture as a boy when he assisted his father, a local sculptor of wooden santos. He turned decisively to sculpture after he arrived in Mexico from his native Costa Rica in 1936 and developed a wide-ranging body of work based on the figure that spanned direct carving in wood, modeling in clay, sculpting directly on hard stone, and bronze casting. "Desnundo Reclinado de Dolores" is a departure in that it neither reflects his interest in pre-Columbian art nor his persistence in depicting indigenous-looking women with exaggerated hips and stomachs. Instead, it is a classically modeled tour de force performance of a hip-rotated, forearm-supported kneeling female that Rodin would have been proud to have claimed as his own.

FRANCISCO ZUNIGA

After disappointing sales at Weyhe Gallery in 1928, Calder turned from sculpted wire portraits and figures to the more conventional medium of wood. On the advice of sculptor Chaim Gross, he purchased small blocks of wood from Monteath, a Brooklyn supplier of tropical woods. He spent much of that summer on a Peekskill, New York farm carving. In each case, the woodblock suggested how he might preserve its overall shape and character as he subsumed those attributes in a single form. There was a directness about working in wood that appealed to him. Carved from a single block of wood, Woman with Square Umbrella is not very different from the subjects of his wire sculptures except that he supplanted the ethereal nature of using wire with a more corporeal medium. <br>© 2023 Calder Foundation, New York / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

ALEXANDER CALDER

Of Herb Albert’s many bronze cast, silky-black patinated spirit totems, few have the distinctively masculine feel of Warrior. Topped with a descending, serrated crown that could as easily refer to the crest of a bird of prey as the headdress of a Plains Indian chief the title “Warrior” is an apt description that addresses the attributes of strength, courage, and unbreakable spirit among others. Much like the work of Henry Moore, those associations depend, in part, upon negative space to create the dynamic and strong impression this formidable sculpture makes.

HERB ALPERT

<div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Donald Judd's role in defining the Minimalist movement is pivotal. He rejected traditional modes of representation, favoring the creation of objects that challenge viewers to find beauty in simplicity and the precision of industrial materials. Judd transformed the landscape of modern art with forms that are clean, unembellished, and elegant in their simplicity.<em> "Untitled"</em> exemplifies this minimalist approach, where form, material, and longevity are the primary focus.</font></div> <br> <br><div> </div> <br> <br><div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>In the context of Judd's oeuvre, the anodized aluminum surface of <em>"Untitled"</em> allows for a smooth, consistent finish that enhances the minimalist aesthetic by highlighting pure form and material, free from the distractions of imperfections or the need for additional surface treatments like paint. More significantly, an anodized surface is corrosion-resistant, underscoring that Judd is not merely creating art for the present moment but crafting pieces intended to endure indefinitely, preserving their pristine, minimalist aesthetic for posterity. Created in an edition of 12 and measuring 41.5 inches in length, with a depth and height of 6.25 inches, <em>"Untitled" </em>exemplifies this meticulous approach, showcasing the industrial aesthetic that Judd so effectively brought into the realm of fine art. Its clean, unembellished form emphasizes the importance of material and the geometric purity that Judd sought to achieve.</font></div>

DONALD JUDD

IRVING NORMAN - How Come - oil on canvas - 90 x 60 in.

IRVING NORMAN

Alexander Calder's Rouge Mouille (Wet Red) features a background of red circles, some dispersing like explosions, creating a sense of energetic expansion, and others running downward as if streaming trails of a firework display. This animated backdrop is adorned with numerous opaque round balls, predominantly black, but interspersed with striking blue, red, and subtle yellow spheres. The strategic placement of the colorful spheres against the explosive reds captures the awe and spectacle of a fireworks show, transforming the painting into a visual metaphor for this dazzling and celebratory event. The artwork resonates with excitement and vibrancy, encapsulating its ephemeral beauty in a static medium.

ALEXANDER CALDER

<div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Richard Prince's "<em>Untitled</em>" from 2009 is a provocative and multilayered piece that engages with the themes of censorship, appropriation, and the boundaries of art. Prince uses a photographic montage of naked, intertwined bodies—imagery that evokes the explicit nature of an orgy and obscures its tawdry nature with a pattern of pink, egg-shaped acrylic elements covering much of the underlying image. The placement of these shapes is seemingly arbitrary, yet they play a crucial role in how the viewer perceives the piece. This obscuring overlay can be interpreted as a visual metaphor for censorship, alluding to how society imposes restrictions on what is deemed acceptable for public consumption. By covering parts of the bodies, Prince draws attention to the act of censorship itself rather than merely the content being censored. The viewer is left to imagine what lies beneath, heightening the sense of curiosity and the taboo.</font></div> <br> <br><div> </div> <br> <br><div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Prince's work often critiques mass media and the commercialization of culture, and this piece is no exception. By altering found images, he questions the ownership and authorship of visual culture. The "censorship" elements in this work might also reference the commodification of sex and how the media sanitizes or obscures the raw, human aspects of such imagery to make it more palatable for the public.</font></div> <br> <br><div> </div> <br> <br><div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>In "<em>Untitled</em>," Prince challenges viewers to confront their perceptions of morality, art, and the power dynamics inherent in censorship. The work serves as a commentary on how images are manipulated and controlled in society, pushing the boundaries of what is considered art and what is considered obscene. Through this layered approach, Prince continues his exploration of the intersections between art, culture, and societal norms.</font></div>

RICHARD PRINCE

The daughter of minimalist sculptor Tony Smith, Kiki's art is not limited to any single medium or technique, and her work often invites multiple interpretations. Club embodies the form and dimensions of a human leg, the essential element for movement and stability. Smith's title invites the viewer to reimagine a leg as a weapon and consider the fragility of the human condition, the power dynamics of bodily autonomy, and the complex interplay between strength and vulnerability. Such a transformation of a body part into an object conveys both protection and aggression and reflects upon how gender-specific bodies navigate our social and personal environment. Club exemplifies Smith's ability to create pieces rich in symbolism, open to interpretation, and provoke thought about the human experience.

KIKI SMITH

Irving Norman was born in 1906 in Vilna, then part of the Russian Empire, now Lithuania. Norman's immigration to New York City in 1923 was short-lived, as he would return to Europe to fight as part of the Abraham Lincoln battalion against the Spanish dictator Francisco Franco. After the War, Norman would eventually settle in Half Moon Bay, California, where he embarked on a prolific studio practice. <br> <br>Norman's work portrays the horrors of war and his firsthand knowledge of totalitarian dictatorships. Norman's work has been described as "Social Surrealism," and his grand scenes are immediate and arresting. The large-scale works of Norman truly capture the power of his lived experiences; they are as much a visual record as they are a warning for the future, intended to inspire change.

IRVING NORMAN

Manuel Neri was a central figure in the Bay Area Figurative Movement in the 1960s. Instead of abstract forms, the group emphasized emotion through the power of the human form. The present work, "Untitled" (1982), explores the female form on a life-sized scale. Neri preferred to work with just one model throughout his 60-year career, Maria Julia Klimenko. The absence of a face in many of the sculptures adds an element of mystery and ambiguity. The focus of the composition in "Untitled" is the structure and form of the figure. Manuel Neri is represented in numerous museum collections worldwide, including the Addison Gallery/Phillips Academy; Anderson Collection at Stanford University; Art Institute of Chicago; Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University; Cincinnati Art Museum; Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA; Denver Art Museum, the El Paso Museum of Art, Texas; Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; Harvard University Art Museums; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; Honolulu Museum of Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York and the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.

MANUEL NERI

When a horse lies down, it is because it feels safe, which, for Deborah Butterfield, is a way of saying that it is okay to make ourselves vulnerable. "Echo", constructed in ways that respect her foraging skills and ability to weld metalwork, does not adhere to a traditional portrayal of a horse but instead reveals something of its essential nature. Constructed from pieced-together steel sheets, some rippled, others folded or crimped, it is a piece that bears the mark of time, aged to a rust-brown patina, imperfections celebrated rather than concealed. Butterfield's deliberate choice of materials and their treatment adds depth and character, transforming Untitled, Echo into more than just an equine representation — it reflects the rugged beauty and the resilience of the animal it represents.

DEBORAH BUTTERFIELD

An undisputed master of the booming Belgian Neo-Impressionist movement from 1887 onward, Théo van Rysselberghe painted this portrait of his wife, Maria (née Monnom) during the first decade of the twentieth century. He had pressed onward from the influence of Whistler’s Tonalism, Impressionism, and the Pointillism of Seurat to perfect a highly refined understanding of color, its harmonic resonances, and a meticulous rendering of formal elements. An exemplary draftsman, optical impressions based on color interactions remained a principal concern for Van Rysselberghe. Here, short strokes of color replaced the small dots of a Pointillist, and the color scheme is not the homogenized, harmonious one for which the artist has a well-deserved reputation. Rather, this portrait advances color theory in an entirely different manner. Its visual interest rests with the dynamic contrasts of his wife’s silvered coiffure, her platinum-hued dress, and the stark-white fireplace mantle — all staged within the optical vibrancy of the surround dominated by complementary reds and greens. It is a visually stimulating demonstration by a painter who understood the dynamic impact of this unusual color scheme and who arranged the sitter with a strong accent on a diagonal and executed the formula with the craft and agility of a painter in full control of his painterly assets.

THÉO VAN RYSSELBERGHE

Manuel Neri's early paper mâché works broke ground in sculptural technique, and his approach to painting his sculptures reflects his deep engagement with the expressive potential of color and form. The choice and placement of colors in Hombre Colorado II create a particularly visceral response that reflects his nuanced understanding of the psychological and emotional dimension of color. Conceptualized and produced in 1958, Hombre Colorado II reflects a time when Neri and his wife Joan Brown were engaged in a rich artistic exchange of creativity and contributed significantly to the evolution of their respective styles and the Bay Area Figurative Movement, in which they played vital roles.

MANUEL NERI

"A Dream Within a Dream" is a significant series of paintings and silkscreens by Ryan McGinnes that takes its name from a famous poem by Edgar Allan Poe. Exploring themes of perception, reality, and the subconscious mind, McGinnes incorporates a variety of symbols and motifs, including geometric shapes, botanical elements, and figurative motifs, which he arranges in intricate patterns that seem to shift and morph before the viewer's eyes. The title suggests a sense of ambiguity and uncertainty, reflecting the elusive nature of reality and the fleeing quality of human experience. By engaging with themes of perception and illusion, McGinnes encourages viewers to question their assumptions about the world and to consider the possibility that reality may be more fluid and subjective than it appears.

RYAN MCGINNESS

Deborah Butterfield is an American sculptor, best known for her sculptures of horses made of objects ranging from wood, metal, and other found objects. The 1981 piece, Untitled (Horse), is comprised of sticks and paper on wire armature. The impressive scale of this piece creates a remarkable effect in person, presenting a striking example of Butterfield's celebrated subject matter. Butterfield originally created the horses from wood and other materials found on her property in Bozeman, Montana and saw the horses as a metaphorical self-portrait, mining the emotional resonance of these forms.

DEBORAH BUTTERFIELD

Shaped by his native Italy and adopted America, Joseph Stella investigated an extraordinary range of styles and mediums in artworks of astonishing diversity and originality. In 1911, Stella rode the avant-garde wave of Fauvist, Cubist, and Futurist trends, but he was the only American modernist who lived day-to-day with the Italian Old Masters. The pose and handling of "Reclining Nude" relates to a series of works Stella painted during the 1920s depicting seductive women from mythological or fantasy sources such as "Leda and the Swan" and Ondine, a beautiful water nymph from a popular 19th-century romantic German fairy tale. Portrayed instead without floral or symbolist imagery, Reclining Nude, painted in the 1930s, more appropriately reflects that sobering time.

JOSEPH STELLA

IRVING NORMAN - Snapshots - oil on canvas - 40 x 90 in.

IRVING NORMAN

During the late 1990s, Manuel Neri began to transform numerous plaster sculptures into bronze, frequently returning to earlier works to produce newly imagined renditions of each piece. These series, nearly indistinguishable in shape and surface detail, explore the impact of varying color schemes and mark-making that involve various actions, including incising brushing, scraping, or layering materials. By experimenting with different marking techniques, Neri could explore the interplay between form, color, texture, and light. In the context of Standing Figure No. 3, Neri limited his palette to an analogous color scheme, thinning the paint to create subtle gradations that enhance the sculpture's sleek, refined exterior.

MANUEL NERI

<div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>Harry Bertoia was an authentic visionary in art, and they are rare. Of those whose métier is sculpture, Alexander Calder and Harry Bertoia are the twentieth-century American standouts. They are engineers of beauty; their creative currency is feats of invention and pure artistry that honor our experience of them (if we are willing to quiet our mind) as if a sacred event. It was Duchamp who suggested Calder call his kinetic works “mobiles”, but it was up to Bertoia himself to coin a word to describe something for which there was little precedent. Visually precise, kinetic, and offering resonant, vibratory sound, a “Sonambient” sculpture is at once a metaphor for our sentient experience in the world yet capable of inducing an aura of transcendent experience. Given that insight, it is easy to understand Bertoia’s view that “I don’t hold onto terms like music and sculpture anymore. Those old distinctions have lost all their meaning.”</font></div> <br> <br><div> </div> <br> <br><div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>The present “Sonambient” sculpture is a forty-eight-inch-tall curtain of thin-gauged tines. Once activated, it becomes a 15 3/4 inch long, 8 inches deep wall of sound. Five rows of narrow tines are staggered in number, alternating between 30 and 29 tines that, when activated, present as an undulating wall of sound. When touched or moved by air currents, the rods produce a sound that, while metallic, does not betray its source of inspiration: the serene connection Bertoia felt in observing the gentle undulating movement of desert grasses. As always, this is a Bertoia sculpture that invites participation in the experience of changing shapes and sounds, a participatory work that asks us to be present in the moment, to connect across time with the object and its creator.</font></div>

HARRY BERTOIA

The Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) was a prosperous period that helped shape Chinese history's foundations for future centuries. This era was marked by notable technological and cultural advances, including gunpowder and printing. Among artistic advances during this period was the perfection of the sancai glaze technique, which was a prominent attribute of sculpture during this period. Sancai (tri-colored) glazing used the three glaze-colors were ochre or brown, green and clear. Glazed wares were much more costly to produce than other terracotta wares, and were therefore only reserved for the wealthiest patrons. <br> <br>This Sancai-Glazed Horse would have been an incredible status symbol for its owner and many have been lost to time. This sculpture is comparable to examples held in museum collections worldwide, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

CHINESE

The Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) was a prosperous cultural period that helped shape Chinese history's foundations for future centuries. This era was marked by notable technological and cultural advances, including gunpowder and printing. Among artistic advances during this period was the perfection of the sancai glaze technique, which was a prominent attribute of sculpture during this period. Sancai (tri-colored) glazing; the three glaze-colors used were ochre or brown, green and clear. Glazed wares where much more costly to produce than other terracotta wares, and were therefore only reserved for the wealthiest patrons. <br> <br>The Sancai-Glazed Earth Spirit offered here depicts a "Zhenmushou." These are mythical hybrid creatures whose bodies are a combination of dogs, lions, boars and other animals. These fierce looking beasts would be found in pairs guarding the entrance of Tang Dynasty tombs.

CHINESE

FRANCIS CELENTANO - Undulating Units - acrylic on canvas - 36 x 90 in.

FRANCIS CELENTANO

MARC QUINN - Lovebomb - photo laminate on aluminum - 108 1/4 x 71 3/4 x 37 3/4 in.

MARC QUINN

IRVING NORMAN - Man and Time - oil on canvas - 58 x 30 in.

IRVING NORMAN

CHARLES ARNOLDI - Sticky Wicket - acrylic, modeling paste and sticks on plywood - 44 1/4 x 91 x 3 in.

CHARLES ARNOLDI

Wayne Thiebaud is widely admired as a painter. Yet his ability as a draftsman is equally compelling and particularly evident in lithography, an autographic medium celebrated for documenting an artist's every gesture. As Paint Cans fully demonstrates, lithography also provides the freedom to layer texturally and with colors to achieve a canny representation of an artist's articulated intentions. In composition, "Paint Cans" displays Thiebaud's keen sense of order, deriving from an emphasis on focal points and directional lines that demonstrate the unique ways he can highlight a grouping of everyday items. It is yet another work that amazes the viewer with his highly detailed technique and skills.

WAYNE THIEBAUD

Pellegrini returns to Classical Mythology to paint an adapted narration of the love story of Cupid and Psyche. Traditionally, Psyche was a young princess who was hailed for her beauty and unfortunately caught the eye of a jealous Venus. Venus entrusted Cupid to punish Psyche by making her fall in love with something hideous. Cupid accidently scratched himself with his amorous dart, by which he immediately fell in love with Psyche. As a result, Cupid disobeyed his mother’s orders to punish Psyche. Ultimately they married, but not before Psyche completed a number of painstaking and nearly impossible tasks at the behest of Venus. <br> <br>Pellegrini’s interpretation of this myth is cast over two canvases with different chromatic palettes, oscillating on a spectrum of abstraction and representation. This creates a disorienting temporal effect that creates a sense of mystery surrounding the passage of time between two lovers.

MAX PELLEGRINI

Jaudon was one of the founders of the Pattern and Decoration movement. With a foundation of feminist theory, Jaudon repositioned what were considered trivial art forms and minor visual images. These forms and symbols were relegated because of their association with the feminine or non-Western. <br> <br>At the same time, Palmyra exemplifies the ability of Jaudon to create aesthetically beautiful works. Jaudon interweaves shades of red into ornate arabesques recalling gothic stonework, celtic knots, and Islamic calligraphy. The crispness of the lines against the impasto and the layering of red tones makes it appear that the lines are carved like stone.

VALERIE JAUDON

Few celebrities define the 70s like Farrah Fawcett. A charter member of the television show "Charlie's Angels," her iconic hairstyle known as "The Farrah," featuring soft, flowing layers that framed the face, with a bouncy, voluminous appearance achieved by flipping the ends of the layers outward became a defining look of the decade. Warhol's portrait represents Fawcett herself and provides broader commentary on the period's social and cultural trends. Most compellingly, these two gorgeous portraits testify to her natural, sun-kissed features and healthy, athletic physique that resonated as a symbol of ideal beauty during her time.

ANDY WARHOL

<div><font face=Calibri size=3 color=black>In 1853, a twenty-three-year-old Bierstadt commenced study at the Düsseldorf Academy, the school primarily responsible for shaping the technical precision and atmospheric depth of the preeminent American landscape painters of the second half of the 19th century. Four years later, in the company of fellow artist Sanford Robinson Gifford, he painted <em>“Capri.”</em> Inscribed with the title and dated “June 11, 1857,” it is a striking example of the young artist’s early mastery, painted just two years before his watershed campaign in 1859 in the company of Frederick W. Lander, a land surveyor for the United States government. It is a fully realized study emphasizing the precision, detailed observation, and careful glazing technique indicative of the academic tradition of gradually building up the surface. He would begin with a detailed drawing, followed by monochromatic underpainting and successive layers of thin, transparent color glazes that achieve depth and luminosity in the translucent hues of the seawater rarely matched in the annals of landscape painting. <em>“Capri”</em> is a lovely achievement that foreshadows the drama and grandeur that would define Bierstadt’s later work, illustrating how his time in Italy helped shape his approach to landscape painting.</font></div>

ALBERT BIERSTADT

The Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) was a prosperous cultural period that helped shape Chinese history's foundations for future centuries. This era was marked by notable technological and cultural advances, including gunpowder and printing. Among artistic advances during this period was the perfection of the sancai glaze technique, which was a prominent attribute of sculpture during this period. Sancai (tri-colored) glazing; the three glaze-colors used were ochre or brown, green and clear. Glazed wares where much more costly to produce than other terracotta wares, and were therefore only reserved for the wealthiest patrons. <br> <br>The Sancai-Glazed Earth Spirit offered here depicts a "Zhenmushou." These are mythical hybrid creatures whose bodies are a combination of dogs, lions, boars and other animals. These fierce looking beasts would be found in pairs guarding the entrance of Tang Dynasty tombs.

CHINESE

SETH KAUFMAN - Lignum Spire - bronze with green patina - 103 1/2 x 22 x 17 in.

SETH KAUFMAN

JOANNA POUSETTE-DART - Untitled (Red Desert Study) - acrylic on wood panel - 33 1/2 x 42 x 3/4 in.

JOANNA POUSETTE-DART

Andy Warhol carried a Polaroid camera as a relentless chronicler of life and its encounters from the late 1950s until he died in 1987. The vast collection of Polaroids he amassed are spontaneous, unpolished, often raw, and serve as a chronicle of his time, similar to how Instagram reflects our current era. Another person could have taken this self-portrait, creating a thinly veiled proposition asking the viewer to accept it as a self-portrait, or perhaps it was achieved solely by Warhol using an external self-timer accessory. It is a portrait that celebrates the device upon which Warhol's life essentially turned, a carefully staged homage to his relationship with the Polaroid camera.

ANDY WARHOL

MARILYN MINTER - After Hours - chromogenic print - 85 1/2 x 55 3/4 in.

MARILYN MINTER

ANDY WARHOL - Self-Portrait with Camera (diptych) - Polaroid, Polacolor - 4 1/4 x 3 3/8 in. ea.

ANDY WARHOL

ROBERT NATKIN - Apollo XL - acrylic on canvas - 88 x 116 1/4 in.

ROBERT NATKIN

A young man and woman embrace one another, a woman holds a child, a sleeping baby holds a black and red thread, another young woman undresses, and an angel spreads its wings in this collage like composition. Together, these characters create a narrative in which young love, fate, and life are intertwined: the sleeping baby holds a red thread and black thread, reminiscent of the mythological three Fates, who spun life and death on their loom. These threads are physically connected to the young lovers, who embrace each other, wholly unaware of the hold that the infant has on them. A woman holding a child watches over the love of the youthful boy and girl, just as Mary and Jesus watch over and defend mankind. The merging of narratives and symbols is a common element in Pellegrini’s oeuvre, and is masterfully expressed here.

MAX PELLEGRINI

HASSEL SMITH - Eyeball to Eyeball - oil on canvas - 46 x 46 in.

HASSEL SMITH

ANDY WARHOL - Self-Portrait - Polaroid, Polacolor - 4 1/2 x 3 3/8 in.

ANDY WARHOL

ANDY WARHOL - Self-Portrait in Drag - Polaroid - 4 1/4 x 3 3/8 in.

ANDY WARHOL

ANDY WARHOL - The Shadow (from Myths) - color screenprint with diamond dust on paper - 37 1/2 x 37 1/2 in.

ANDY WARHOL

The Queen of the Night drinks water from the clasped hands of faith, while two shepherds embrace each other, unaware of Jesus’ birth. Angels, portrayed almost translucently on the canvas, spray holy water and bring about the giving of gifts. A precious jewel is depicted in the right corner, while a humble basket of turkeys sits on the cape of the Madonna. Nearby rests a basket with a goldfinch, an ancient symbol, which is a harbinger of good luck for newborn babies. The baby Jesus, just as the clasped hands that the Queen drinks out of, represents faith – the angels have sprinkled with holy water and he will soon make himself known to the world. <br> <br>“For me the faith in religion becomes faith in painting and will defeat the giants." – Max Pellegrini, July 2015, in conversation with Curator Chip Tom

MAX PELLEGRINI

Mirror images of a cloaked figure embrace a bare-chested and bearded man, who is almost child-like in his relative stature. Their embrace mirrors that of Michelangelo’s Pieta, and the many similar depictions of Christ and the Madonna. A dark shade of blue casts a shadow over the composition, assuredly a temporal indicator, but possibly a reference to Picasso’s blue period as well, a major influencer on Pellegrini’s artwork. The wall panels behind the figures depict religious scenes, and remind the viewer of stained glass walls in churches and chapels. Light shines from windows in the city below, also illuminated by a full moon peaking over mountainous scenery.

MAX PELLEGRINI

In an abstracted image of St. Peter’s basilica in Rome, Pellegrini returns to religious narratives to express his “anti-ideological and anti-pauperist” impression of the church and its relationship with faith (Antonio Monda, “Interview with Max Pellegrini). In the lower half of the painting, the birth of Jesus is the central focus, while the life of the church is highlighted in the upper half. According to Pellegrini, he depicted the birth of Jesus in the style of a baroque 18th century Neapolitan nativity scene that can be interpreted “as a feast for the birth of faith.” This faith is conceived of as “the material support for the Popes’ power and of the Church’s glory,” represented in this painting by the Pope clutching the moon in his hand. <br> <br> <br>- Partial text adapted from Max Pellegrini, July 2015, in conversation with Curator Chip Tom

MAX PELLEGRINI

From the late 1990’s to the early 2000’s, Pellegrini returned to his paintings in the Life of an Anarchist series, “reworked them, constructed them in ‘layers,’ corrected them, initiated series or returned to iconographies of his past works.” These paintings, which are dedicated to Pellegrini’s wife Roberta, depict a woman who is free and positive, and are part of a long line of works in which there is an absolute female protagonist. (Sara D’Alessandro, “Biography,” in Max Pellegrini, ed. Danilo Eccher, 2014). Pellegrini had his wife in mind for these paintings, since “she considers herself an integrated anarchist, a woman with no prejudice but not fanatical or destructive.” <br> <br>- Partial text adapted from Max Pellegrini, July 2015, in conversation with Curator Chip Tom

MAX PELLEGRINI

AI WEIWEI - "Fairytale" Chairs - wood - 49 x 45 x 17 1/2 in.

AI WEIWEI

Provenance: <br>Heather James, CA <br>Private collection, NV (acquired from above May, 2000)

CHINESE