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Lot Essay
In the mid-1960s, Philip Guston withdrew from the New York art scene to Woodstock, where his work began to take a discernible turn from the abstraction he had practiced. Largely influenced by the racial atrocities and the general social upheaval of the late-1960s in the United States, Guston began creating a dynamic visual universe which directly and unabashedly confronted the injustices he witnessed. Painting in bursts of thick, fleshy pinks with a cast of commanding, cartoon-ish figures, Guston embarked on a challenging creative endeavor: to look racist violence square in the face.
“When the 1960s came along, I was feeling split, schizophrenic. The war, what was happening in America, the brutality of the world. What kind of man am I, sitting at home, reading magazines…and then going into my studio to adjust a red to a blue.” Philip Guston
The present lot, from 1971, is a formidable and polished example of this iconic series. Rendered in freely applied, brushy black lines, a large central figure dressed in an ill-fitting suit is flanked by two hooded figures, seemingly caught up in conversation. Standing with his back turned towards us, the central figure acts as an immediate barrier to empathetic engagement, while the masked figures are unified as a group, a collective force rather than individuals. The energy is intentionally difficult to read. The central figure – perhaps a self-portrait, indicated by the worried, wrinkled head – could just as easily be in the middle of a banal conversation with the Klansmen as he could be confronting them. The viewer may hope for the latter, but at the crux of this series is Guston’s exploration of the proximity of evil. Indeed, Guston’s images of Klansmen, which he called “hoods,” are designed to unsettle; the cheerful rosy palette and puffy, childlike characters belie a serious social critique and the uncomfortable realization that evil can be casual. The artist once noted, “What do [Klansmen] do afterwards? Or before? Smoke, drink, sit around their rooms … patrol empty streets; dumb, melancholy, guilty, fearful, remorseful, reassuring one another?”
The whimsical figures in Guston’s work inhabit a world that is rendered with childlike simplicity. They are often seen wielding basic wooden planks adorned with rusty nails, and they drive cars with nearly square wheels. While they exude an underlying malevolence, it is overshadowed by a sense of pathos. They may appear blustery, yet they are no more menacing than plump pillows. Their sinister aspect is tempered by absurdity, turning them into symbols of humanity's capacity for cruelty.
“If his work resembles a cartoon…that is because the same mistakes and the same atrocities are repeated throughout history with cartoon-like predictability,” (A. Graham-Dixon, “A Maker of Worlds: The Later Paintings of Philip Guston,” in M. Auping ed., Philip Guston: Retrospective, exh. cat., Royal Academy, London, 2004).
Guston’s departure from his earlier, abstract work, in exchange for a more clunky and less traditionally refined style was a bold act of iconoclastic rebellion in itself. By enlisting painters and art critics in what he termed his "cartoon goon squad," he may have aimed to emphasize the underlying message of his iconoclasm. Indeed, Guston's renewed interest in figuration not only reintroduced the human form into his artistic vocabulary but also provided an energized space for storytelling. Guston’s mute and dumb thugs are all the more sinister because they never actively harm anyone; instead, they drive around looking for victims. They carry bully sticks and bricks. They smoke cigars, they plot and plan. Guston paints them in soft pastel hues, with cartoon-like features that border—precariously—on sweetness, with the levity of cartoon violence.
An underlying sense of the macabre resonates in the present lot, akin to the haunting quality found in James Ensor's Masks Confronting Death. In Ensor's work, grotesque and distorted figures collide in a macabre dance of surrealism, exploring the eerie side of human existence through his own form of artistic social critique. Guston's painting carries a similar disquiet, where the absurdity and the macabre intersect, rendering its subjects disturbingly familiar and anodyne.
Philip Guston's artistic evolution, epitomized by works like "Untitled," represents a bold departure from tradition and an unyielding commitment to expressing profound societal themes. Through a singular visual language, Guston relentlessly challenges conventions, highlighting the enduring relevance of art as a mirror to the social and political complexities of its time.
“When the 1960s came along, I was feeling split, schizophrenic. The war, what was happening in America, the brutality of the world. What kind of man am I, sitting at home, reading magazines…and then going into my studio to adjust a red to a blue.” Philip Guston
The present lot, from 1971, is a formidable and polished example of this iconic series. Rendered in freely applied, brushy black lines, a large central figure dressed in an ill-fitting suit is flanked by two hooded figures, seemingly caught up in conversation. Standing with his back turned towards us, the central figure acts as an immediate barrier to empathetic engagement, while the masked figures are unified as a group, a collective force rather than individuals. The energy is intentionally difficult to read. The central figure – perhaps a self-portrait, indicated by the worried, wrinkled head – could just as easily be in the middle of a banal conversation with the Klansmen as he could be confronting them. The viewer may hope for the latter, but at the crux of this series is Guston’s exploration of the proximity of evil. Indeed, Guston’s images of Klansmen, which he called “hoods,” are designed to unsettle; the cheerful rosy palette and puffy, childlike characters belie a serious social critique and the uncomfortable realization that evil can be casual. The artist once noted, “What do [Klansmen] do afterwards? Or before? Smoke, drink, sit around their rooms … patrol empty streets; dumb, melancholy, guilty, fearful, remorseful, reassuring one another?”
The whimsical figures in Guston’s work inhabit a world that is rendered with childlike simplicity. They are often seen wielding basic wooden planks adorned with rusty nails, and they drive cars with nearly square wheels. While they exude an underlying malevolence, it is overshadowed by a sense of pathos. They may appear blustery, yet they are no more menacing than plump pillows. Their sinister aspect is tempered by absurdity, turning them into symbols of humanity's capacity for cruelty.
“If his work resembles a cartoon…that is because the same mistakes and the same atrocities are repeated throughout history with cartoon-like predictability,” (A. Graham-Dixon, “A Maker of Worlds: The Later Paintings of Philip Guston,” in M. Auping ed., Philip Guston: Retrospective, exh. cat., Royal Academy, London, 2004).
Guston’s departure from his earlier, abstract work, in exchange for a more clunky and less traditionally refined style was a bold act of iconoclastic rebellion in itself. By enlisting painters and art critics in what he termed his "cartoon goon squad," he may have aimed to emphasize the underlying message of his iconoclasm. Indeed, Guston's renewed interest in figuration not only reintroduced the human form into his artistic vocabulary but also provided an energized space for storytelling. Guston’s mute and dumb thugs are all the more sinister because they never actively harm anyone; instead, they drive around looking for victims. They carry bully sticks and bricks. They smoke cigars, they plot and plan. Guston paints them in soft pastel hues, with cartoon-like features that border—precariously—on sweetness, with the levity of cartoon violence.
An underlying sense of the macabre resonates in the present lot, akin to the haunting quality found in James Ensor's Masks Confronting Death. In Ensor's work, grotesque and distorted figures collide in a macabre dance of surrealism, exploring the eerie side of human existence through his own form of artistic social critique. Guston's painting carries a similar disquiet, where the absurdity and the macabre intersect, rendering its subjects disturbingly familiar and anodyne.
Philip Guston's artistic evolution, epitomized by works like "Untitled," represents a bold departure from tradition and an unyielding commitment to expressing profound societal themes. Through a singular visual language, Guston relentlessly challenges conventions, highlighting the enduring relevance of art as a mirror to the social and political complexities of its time.