Phillips' London Photographs Auction, 22 November 2022

Phillips' London Photographs Auction

22 November 2022

Sale on 22 November to be led by Richard Avedon’s Iconic 1967 Portrait Portfolio of The Beatles

Richard Avedon

Richard Avedon, The Beatles Portfolio: John Lennon, Ringo Starr, George Harrison and Paul McCartney, London, August 11, 1967 

© The Richard Avedon Foundation

Estimate: £700,000 - 900,000

Phillips announces highlights ahead of the London Photographs auction on 22 November. Comprising 139 lots, the sale is led by Richard Avedon’s career-defining work The Beatles Portfolio of 1967. Opening the sale is the single-owner offering A View from the Garden: Photographs from a Private Cotswolds Collection, featuring works by 20th-century masters Peter Hujar, Imogen Cunningham, and Robert Mapplethorpe, among others. This season’s ULTIMATE showcases sold-out works by Zhang Huan, Sohei Nishino and Bastiaan Woudt as well as works by auction newcomers Prince Gyasi, Ilona Langbroek, Alice Mann, Susan Gamble, and Jeremy Cowart. Other sale highlights include works by Man Ray, Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz, Helmut Newton, Wolfgang Tillmans, and Nick Brandt. Closing the sale is ULTIMATE ELLEN VON UNWERTH, a selection of 20 Polaroids premiering at Phillips. The auction is online now with highlights previously on view in Phillips Paris gallery from 7-11 November and a public preview in Phillips London galleries on Berkeley Square from 16-22 November until the live auction on 22 November at 2pm.

Yuka Yamaji, Head of Photographs, Europe, and Rachel Peart, Head of Department, London, said, “We are delighted to present our November auction, which features our top lot The Beatles Portfolio – legendary photographer Richard Avedon’s generation-defining portraits of 20th century’s most iconic band as well as the single-owner offering A View from the Garden: Photographs from a Private Cotswolds Collection, including two exceptional works by Peter Hujar. The 16th edition of ULTIMATE presents collectors with a curated selection of exclusive works available for sale only at Phillips and introduces two new mediums to Phillips Photographs – a hologram and an NFT – both by artists debuting at auction. We look forward to welcoming visitors to view the sale in person in our Paris and London galleries this November.”

Leading the sale is Richard Avedon’s celebrated portrait portfolio of The Beatles, which has remained in a private collection for over 20 years. Issued in small edition of 6 plus 3 artist’s proofs and rendered in the intensely saturated colours of the dye-transfer process, Avedon’s portraits of The Beatles leverage the photographer’s unfailing eye for the cultural moment and capture the genre-defying impact of four of the 20th century’s most significant musicians. Avedon’s The Beatles Portfolio, first published in Look magazine in January 1968, is as much a collective portrait of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr as it is of the decade in which it was made. The musicians and the photographer were at the height of their careers when they came together in a penthouse studio in Thompson House, London, in August of 1967, to make these images, and the resulting portraits represent a collaboration of visionary proportions.

Also featured in the sale are Richard Avedon’s iconic photographs of Audrey Hepburn and Nastassja Kinski as well as works from Nick Brandt and Wolfgang Tillmans.

Richard Avedon

Audrey Hepburn and Art Buchwald with Simone, Barbara Mullen, Frederick Eberstadt and Dr. Reginald Kernan, Evening Dresses by Balmain, Dior, Patou, Maxim's, Paris, August, 1959

Estimate: £40,000 - 60,000

Richard Avedon

Nastassja Kinski and the Serpent, Los Angeles, California, June 14, 1981

Estimate: £55,000 - 75,000

Nick Brandt

Elephant Drinking, Amboseli, 2007

Estimate: £70,000 - 90,000k

Wolfgang Tillmans

Collum, 2011

Estimate: £50,000 - 70,000

Included in ULTIMATE this November is Zhang Huan’s Family Tree, which was produced in 2000, after Zhang’s move to New York, and presents an intimate exploration of culture and selfhood. The writing on his face includes Chinese proverbs, family relations and histories, literary texts and words deriving from the ancient practice of physiognomy. Gradually obscuring Zhang’s discernible features, the calligraphy shifts from legibility into an obliterating mask. Using the camera to record the evolution of this ephemeral performance, the artist delves into the correlation between his natural and constructed self. The nine photographs of Family Tree together transform viewers into participants, inviting them not only to engage with Zhang’s performance, but also to reflect upon their own intrinsic and constructed identities.

Zhang Huan

Family Tree, 2000

Estimate: £60,000 - 80,000

Bastiaan Woudt’s 2020 Rhythm comes to auction this November through ULTIMATE. In this monumental, monochromatic work, Woudt highlights the essential elements of his subject’s silhouette, obscuring part of her face with a large, flat circle, against a plain background. Rhythm encapsulates the self-taught photographer’s bold yet elegant aesthetic, developed through experimentations in both in-camera and post-production techniques. Drawing inspiration from black-and-white photographs by 20th century masters Irving Penn and Richard Avedon, Woudt aims to capture the essence of analogue photography through digital means. This striking image graces the cover of his 2021 monograph, also titled Rhythm, and was featured in his first solo museum exhibition, Twist, at Bergen’s Museum Kranenburgh.  

Bastiaan Woudt

Rhythm, 2020

Estimate: £18,000 - 22,000

Further highlights of ULTIMATE are photo-based works from artists making their debut at Phillips this November, including Prince Gyasi, Alice Mann, Ilona Langbroek, Susan Gamble, and Jeremy Cowart.

Prince Gyasi

The Arrival, 2022

Estimate: £18,000 - 22,000

Alice Mann

Dr Van Der Ross Drummies, Cape Town, South Africa, 2017

Estimate: £10,000 - 15,000 

A highlight of the sale is the single-owner offering A View from the Garden: Photographs from a Private Cotswolds Collection. Featuring over 30 works, this selection showcases an array of established masters such as Peter Hujar, Imogen Cunningham, Diane Arbus, and Robert Mapplethorpe as well as contemporary talents such as Joel Sternfeld, Vik Muniz, and Robert Polidori. This collection effortlessly balances strong examples of portraiture, still life and landscape with abstraction and conceptual art to capture the breadth the medium has to offer.

Peter Hujar

Christopher Street Pier #2, Cross Legs, 1976

Estimate: £12,000 - 18,000

Joel Sternfeld

The East Meadows, Northampton, Massachusetts

August 19, 2006

Estimate: £8,000 - 12,000 

In addition to the live auction on 22 November, a dedicated online-only sale will open for bidding from 16 to 23 November. A Classic Vision: Photographs from A Private European Collection will feature over 50 classic photographs from 20th century masters, including Henri Cartier-Bresson, Bill Brandt, Elliott Erwitt, and Garry Winogrand.

*Estimates do not include buyer’s premium; prices achieved include the hammer price plus buyer’s premium

London Auction Preview: 16 November - 22 November 2022

Auction: 22 November 2022 2pm GMT

Location: 30 Berkeley Square, London, United Kingdom, W1J 6EX

PHILLIPS LONDON

30 Berkeley Square, London, W1J 6EX

www.phillips.com

Zhang Huan: Hope Tunnel at UCCA Beijing

Zhang Huan: Hope Tunnel
Ullens Center for Contemporary Art - UCCA, Beijing
Through October 24, 2010

Zhang Huan’s Hope Tunnel is a curated social project related to the 2008 earthquake in Wenchuan, Sichuan Province.

“Hope Tunnel is conceptual art on a grand scale, a monument to hope, a space in which art becomes a vehicle for awareness, philanthropy and the public good. A towering display of destructive power frozen in time, it allows us to reflect on the scale of recent earthquake disasters, commemorate the victims and contemplate the possibility of reconstruction and the challenges that lie ahead.”

UCCA Director Jérôme Sans describes Hope Tunnel as being “conceived by an artist who believes that art has the power not just to move us emotionally, but to galvanize us into positive action. We may be dwarfed by the wreckage of freight train no. 21043 and humbled by the destruction wrought by nature, but as the title reminds us, we still have the power to help—and to hope.”

Artist Zhang Huan calls his train “a witness to history” that should be preserved. “At a time when the whole world is looking toward the future, preserving the past seems more important than ever. Reflecting on the disaster, investigating the causes, mitigating future dangers and finding ways to live in harmony with our environment rather than trying to conquer it—that’s where the real future is, the tunnel of hope that leads us to tomorrow."

Moving beyond “art for the sake of art”

Hope Tunnel is more than just a train, an installation piece or a Memento mori that recalls our own mortality. It is a multi-faceted philanthropic project and an experiment in using art to serve the public good.

“As a non-profit public arts center, UCCA is in a unique position to carry out curated social projects such as Hope Tunnel. Free of the artistic constraints and profit motives that restrict many traditional museums and galleries, UCCA possesses the resources, vision and innovation needed to harness the social and philanthropic power of art.”

“At UCCA, we are committed to engaging not just with the “art world” but with society in general and the world at large. Through exhibitions, films and educational events that reflect what is happening in Beijing, in China and around the globe, we seek to create a forum for dialogue and a place for developing innovative solutions. “

“Art should be about more than just making pretty things and putting on spectacles,” says UCCA Director Jérôme Sans. “It means caring about the world around you and giving something back to society.”

The long journey of freight train no. 21043

When the Sichuan earthquake struck on May 12, 2008, freight train no. 21043 was passing through a tunnel in the border region between Gansu, Sichuan and Shaanxi Provinces. Loaded down with grain and aviation fuel, the train collided with a boulder, caught fire and became trapped in the tunnel's inferno. It took workers six months to dig out the wreckage, clear the tunnel and reopen the railway line to earthquake-damaged areas of Sichuan.

When he heard the news reports and saw the photos of the Sichuan earthquake and the train disaster, Zhang Huan was badly shaken. Realizing that the train had both historical value and emotional resonance, he decided to try to preserve it for posterity. After a long and complicated process, the artist managed to obtain the wreckage and transport it to his studio in Shanghai for selective renovation.

When two large carriages of the train are installed in UCCA's largest exhibition hall amidst railway tracks and quake debris, visitors are able to examine the wreckage and watch a documentary that follows every step of the train’s journey from a salvage company in Xi’an to Zhang Huan’s workshop in Shanghai to UCCA in Beijing. A percentage of ticket sales will go to the Red Cross Society of China Jet Li One Foundation Project to fund disaster relief and reconstruction projects in Yushu, Qinghai Province.

In conjunction with Hope Tunnel, two of Zhang Huan’s large incense-ash sculptures are on display in the UCCA lobby: Military Officer and Cultural Officer.

BIOGRAPHY: ZHANG HUANG

Internationally acclaimed artist Zhang Huan was born in 1965 in Anyang, Henan. He currently lives and works in Shanghai. As an active member of the Beijing art scene in the 1990's, he was involved mainly in performance art and was considered one of the foremost avant-garde artists in China. After relocating to New York in 1998, he became a full-time artist working in a variety of different mediums and giving artistic performances in major cities worldwide.

In 2005, he returned to Shanghai and established the Zhang Huan Studio, where he continues his artistic work, expanding into new realms and developing new forms. The ash-painting technique he created has added another method of painting to the art history books. Zhang Huan has also pioneered a variety of other techniques, such as sculpting in ox-hide, wooden door carvings, and woodcuts with feather additions, to name just a few.

In 2009, Zhang Huan directed and stage-managed the lyric opera Semele, performed at the La Monnaie Royal Theatre in Belgium. He is the first Chinese modern artist to direct a lyric opera. In 2005, Zhang Huan and his wife founded the Gao An Foundation, which establishes "hope elementary schools" in impoverished areas of western China. They have also provided scholarships and study grants to ten major universities in China.

Curators: Jérôme Sans, UCCA Director
Project Coordinators：Paula Tsai, Joy Bloser

UCCA - ULLENS CENTER FOR CONTEMPORARY ART - BEIJING - PR CHINA

www.ucca.org.cn

Zhang Huan: Neither Coming Nor Going

Neither Coming Nor Going,
ZHANG HUAN ’s second solo show at PACEWILDENSTEIN
features Rulai, a monumental Buddha and recent large-scale works on paper
based on the 7th-century Chinese prophecy book Tui Bei Tu

© ZHANG HUAN, Rulai, 2008-2009, ash, steel and wood
18' 1/2" x 14' 10" x 10' 11-1/2". Private collection.
Courtesy PaceWildenstein, New York.

The compacted ash surface of Rulai, supported by an internal metal frame, is heavily embedded with miniature porcelain Buddha relics, copper offering dishes, miniature skulls and unburned joss sticks. The strikingly beautiful grisaille palette of the sculpture is sharply contrasted with blood red paper wrappers, clustered around the crown and face of the deity. Burning incense pours out from Buddha’s head, activating a traditionally static art form with performative aspects, one of the artist’s hallmarks.

Using ink, paper handmade from the bark of Mulberry trees, and in some works feathers to build up the surface, Zhang Huan depicts animals and landscapes in the series of unique works on paper included in this exhibition. He references the celebrated 17th-century Chinese painter and calligrapher Bada Shanren as well as Tui Bei Tu, a seventh-century Tang Dynasty prophecy book which reappeared in second-hand book stores in China in the 1990s after being banned by the Communist party. Tui Bei Tu offered an alternative to traditional Eastern and Western systems and presented insight into China’s future, utilizing drawings and poems to prophesize a sequence of sixty events.

Zhang Huan is widely regarded as one of the most vital, influential and provocative contemporary artists working today. His early performances were conceived of as existential explorations and social commentary, and to some degree, the layers of ideas explored in these pieces have carried through to his more traditional studio practice, which he embraced upon moving to Shanghai in 2005, after living and working for eight years in New York City.

His second solo exhibition at PaceWildenstein following the critically-acclaimed September 2009 premiere of Semele, a new production of George Frideric Handel’s opera directed and designed by Zhang Huan. Semele has been presented to audiences at The National Opera of Belgium in Brussels and will be the first full-length Baroque opera to be performed in China this year. Zhang Huan was also the subject of a comprehensive monograph published in 2009 by Phaidon Press as part of their Contemporary Artists series.

    © ZHANG HUAN, Tui Bei Tu No. 75 and Tui Bei Tu No. 74, 2008,
    ink on handmade paper, 12' x 8' 2" - 12' x 8' 2-1/4"
    Courtesy PaceWildenstein, New York

Zhang Huan was born in 1965 in a small town called Anyang in Henan Province just prior to the Cultural Revolution. At one year of age, Zhang Huan went to live with his grandparents in a tiny village in the countryside known as Tangyin County. At fourteen, he started his artistic training in the so-called Su-style or Soviet style and traveled by bus each day for his lessons. Zhang enrolled in undergraduate studies at the Art Department, Henan University, Kaifeng to concentrate on Chinese ink painting, drawing, oil painting and art history in 1984. Upon completion in 1988, Zhang was an instructor of art and Western art history at Zhengzhou College of Education for three years. He studied oil painting at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing from 1991 to 1993, and it was during this period that he first started experimenting with performance art.

At the same time, a group of young Chinese artists, including Zhang Huan, established the Beijing East Village. It was in this community that Zhang developed his early performance practices and many of the works that would soon bring him international attention, such as 12 Square Meters, in which the artist sat for an hour, covered in honey and fish oil, in a fly infested public latrine and To Add One Meter to an Anonymous Mountain, where nine people lay on top of one another to raise the summit by a meter. These performances and many others came to be known by their photographic documentation, which are now considered the artist’s first iconic works.

In 1998, Zhang Huan was included in Inside Out: New Chinese Art organized by Asia Society and P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center. It was during this exhibition that he relocated to New York City. Over the course of the next eight years, Zhang Huan created 13 performances and exhibited in five solo exhibitions and more than 60 group shows throughout the United States. The artist moved back to China in 2006, settling in the southern Min Hang district of Shanghai, where he opened the Zhang Huan Studio and established a Foundation.

Among his many notable exhibitions the Asia Society, New York, presented Zhang Huan: Altered States (2007-08), the largest museum exhibition of the artist’s work to date. Organized by Melissa Chiu, Director of the Asia Society Museum and Vice President of the Society's Global Arts Programming, the exhibition featured 55 of Zhang Huan’s major works produced over the past 15 years in Beijing, New York, and Shanghai. Zhang Huan: Altered States later traveled to the Vancouver Art Gallery.

Zhang Huan’s work is part of nearly 40 public collections worldwide, including Bard College, Center for Curatorial Studies, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York; Center of Contemporary Art, Malaga, Spain; Centre national d’art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris; Centro Galego de Arte Contemporanea, Santiago de Compostela, Spain; Denver Art Museum; The Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; The Israel Museum, Jerusalem; Museum of Contemporary Art, Barcelona; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; New Orleans Museum of Art, Louisiana; Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, Florida; Philadelphia Museum of Art; S.M.A.K., The Municipal Museum of Contemporary Art,Gent, Belgium; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; and Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut, among others.

Zhang Huan: Neither Coming Nor Going

December 11, 2009 — January 30, 2010

PaceWildenstein
545 West 22nd Street
New York, NY

pacewildenstein.com