Beschreibung:

Julie Mehretu Stadia Excerpt (a small resurgence) 2004 ink, acrylic on canvas, laid over wood panel 36 x 47 in. (91.4 x 119.4 cm)
Provenance Carlier Gebauer, Berlin Acquired from the above by the present owner Exhibited León, MUSAC, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León, Julie Mehretu Black City, September 23, 2006 - January 7, 2007, then traveled to Hannover, Kunstverein Hannover (February 9 - April 1, 2007), Humelbæk, Louisiana Museum für Moderne Kunst (June 1 - August 26, 2007) Literature Julie Mehretu Black City, exh. cat., Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León, León, 2006, pp. 112 - 113 (illustrated) "Julie Mehretu: Grey Area, Commission for the Deutsche Guggenheim,"Deutsche Guggenheim Magazine, Issue 9, Fall 2009, p. 9 (illustrated) Video JULIE MEHRETU 'Stadia Excerpt (a small resurgence)', 2004 "Mehretu's works are truly representative of our time. Within them there's a high degree of order, linearity and control but at the same time a tremendous amount of chaos - a sense of a lack of center, a lack of beginning or end. A mirror held up toward contemporary culture." Contemporary Art specialist Benjamin Godsill discusses Mehretu's 'Stadia Excerpt (a small resurgence)', 2004 from our 13 November Evening Sale. Catalogue Essay "I’m not trying to spell out a story. I still think you feel the painting, and the reason you read the mark is because you also feel the mark." Julie Mehretu 2009 Julie Mehretu’s masterwork Stadia Excerpt (a small resurgence) is one in which painting and viewer are united through pure energy and kinetic force. As one stands before the painting, we are left simply marveling at its splendor. Inundated with variously sized shapes which punctuate frenzied and rigid lines, ablaze with bold colors against a lavender background, Stadia Excerpt (a small resurgence) announces itself triumphantly in its powerful imagery. Mehretu is celebrated for her immense canvases deluged in questions of contemporary culture and for her expert handling of media. The abstraction of the work can feel at times jarring when our immediate reaction may be to create and then discover a sense of order in the work, and yet Mehretu asks us not to grasp for understanding and meaning at first encounter. Rather, she simply presents the work, challenging us with its insoluble questions and bewitching us into the fantastical world which she has created. In her microcosm of lexicons, symbols and language, she designs a structure that has been carefully analyzed and yet occurs in an intangible lack of place - a blank topography. When considered through the lens of its production, the work abruptly becomes a singular and perilous moment, operating at a critical intersection of language, culture, symbolism, architecture, and politics. The present lot may arguably be considered the extraordinary apex of Mehretu’s compelling body of works that have utterly cemented her as an authoritative force in the history of art. Stadia Excerpt (a small resurgence) is drawn from a small series of works Mehretu painted in 2004 and her analysis of such relevant motifs of nationalism and insurgency through the spheres of politics, sports, and art. This kinetic work of art represents a herculean effort on the part of the artist to produce a dense amalgamation of geometric shapes and organic forms, at once an aimless explosion of kaleidoscopic color and elegantly contrived in astonishing exactitude. The ultimate composition perfectly captures the unbounded vitality and the chaotic atmosphere in our contemporary global culture. While her cultural themes are critical points of departure for the work, there exist clear and seamless allusions to her art historical forerunners. Notably, the warm orange diamonds and the black quadrilateral reverently nods to the Bauhaus and the Russian constructivist movements of the early twentieth century, and to its champions such as Alexandr Kasmir Malevich and Wassily Kandinsky who devised the notion of abstraction as a method to propagate universalism and collectivity. Mehretu once elaborated, “I am (...) interested in what Kandinsky re