Bird

Details

DAME ELISABETH FRINK, R.A. (1930-1993)
Bird
signed 'Frink' (on the base)
bronze with a dark brown patina
15 1⁄8 in. (38.4 cm.) high
Concieved in 1959 and cast in an edition of 6.

Provenance

with Waddington Galleries, London, where purchased by the present owner's father in July 1969, and by descent.

Literature

D. Hall, Burlington Magazine, July 1970, pp. 560, 565, another cast illustrated as 'Warrior Bird'.
E. Mullins (intro.), The Art of Elisabeth Frink, London, 1972, n.p., no. 19, another cast illustrated.
B. Robertson (intro.), Elisabeth Frink Sculpture: Catalogue Raisonné, Salisbury, 1984, pp. 148-149, no. 56, another cast illustrated.
S. Kent, exhibition catalogue, Elisabeth Frink: Sculpture and Drawings 1952-1984, London, Royal Academy, 1985, pp. 12, 50, no. 12, another cast illustrated.
A. Ratuszniak (ed.), Elisabeth Frink Catalogue Raisonné of Sculpture 1947-93, Farnham, 2013, p. 66, no. FCR67, another cast illustrated.
C. Winner (ed.), exhibition catalogue, Elisabeth Frink: Humans and Other Animals, Norwich, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, 2018, n.p, exhibition not numbered, another cast illustrated.

Exhibited

London, Royal Academy, Elisabeth Frink: Sculpture and Drawings 1952-1984, February - March 1985, no. 12, another cast exhibited.
Norwich, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, Elisabeth Frink: Humans and Other Animals, October 2018 - February 2019, exhibition not numbered, another cast exhibited.

Special Notice

Artist's Resale Right ("Droit de Suite"). Artist's Resale Right Regulations 2006 apply to this lot, the buyer agrees to pay us an amount equal to the resale royalty provided for in those Regulations, and we undertake to the buyer to pay such amount to the artist's collection agent.

Conditions of sale

Brought to you by

Alice Murray Associate Director, Specialist

amurray@christies.com +44 (0)20 7389 2423

Lot Essay

‘I've always worked in plaster, rather than in wax or clay - from the time I first went to Chelsea. It was Bernard Meadows, who was teaching there, who really got me into plaster. And by that time I already knew something about Giacometti, who used plaster, although of course he got a very different result from me. My birds and birdmen were built up on an armature, and then carved back, using chisels and choppers and all sorts of implements. In those days I also used to pick up bits of discarded plaster, and reuse them welded together with new material. That's why the effect is so splintery. The early imagery was a combination of the country, animals and the war’.

- E. Frink quoted in E. Lucie-Smith and E. Frink, Frink: A Portrait, London, 1994, pp. 105-108.

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