Property from a Private Collector Richard Prince Follow Free Love #233 signed, partially titled and dated "Richard Prince 2015 #233" on the overlap inkjet, acrylic and oilstick on canvas 74 3/8 x 54 3/4 in. (189 x 139 cm.) Executed in 2015.
Condition Report Request Condition Report Thank you for your request. The Condition Report will be sent shortly. Contact Us * Required Send me the Report Via Email Fax Contact Specialist Cancel Provenance Sadie Coles HQ, London Acquired from the above by the present owner Exhibited London, Sadie Coles HQ, Richard Prince Free Love , April 12 - June 18, 2016, no. 12, n.p. (illustrated) Catalogue Essay Richard collected some nudist cartoons by this guy John Dempsey. He inked jetted them up and drew a kind of hippie cartoon… kind of like his hippie drawings that he did back in the late eighties. He turned the nudist cartoon into something about free love. Richard always wanted to be part of a commune, but he knew that kind of utopia would never work out. At least that’s what he told me. He figured it was a good idea, the commune… but in the end… he ended up painting the commune. - Joan Katz As detailed in the above excerpt by Joan Katz, a close friend of Prince’s since 1989, Free Love #233 belongs to a recent body of work in which the artist fuses different elements from many of his earlier, acclaimed series, including his Hippie Drawings, Jokes, and Cartoons. The background of the composition is a reproduction of a Playboy magazine cartoon, enlarged to life size and rendered in full color. Prince then overlays the cartoon with a bold quasi-abstract figure, in the style of his widely recognizable Hippie Drawings from the late 1980s that pay homage to modernist masters like Picasso and de Kooning. The painted figure obscures the cartoon with its elongated arms and oversized hands, while its vivid yellow hue enhances the composition with a joyful overtone only heightened by the figure’s wide, laughing smile. Carefully selected gaps in the hippie’s reach reveal candid moments in the original source material. In the upper left, an embracing couple seems more loving than obscene. On the lower right, the original cartoonist’s signature is revealed, but overlaid with a spiral line - Prince's way of adding his own mark. His decision to incorporate an abstract shape rather than an identifiable signature is typical of the artist’s irreverent questioning of traditional notions of authorship. As Prince himself writes: “You can take my work and do anything you want with it. I will not object… What’s genuine anyway?” (Richard Prince quoted in “Rock Lobster: October 20”, Birdtalk , 2017, online) Another hallmark feature of Prince’s practice highlighted in this body of work is his iconic use of text, also appropriated and often humorous. In a nod to his Joke paintings, the lower section of the canvas includes a caption that reads: “Can’t you find a shady nook somewhere else, Mr. Martinez?” The question is presumably posed by the woman sitting in the foreground of the busy outdoor scene whose lap cradles the head of a mustache-bearing man--the shade she references is cast by her sizeable bosom. The man’s position is surprisingly unsexual and almost fetal in nature, further emphasized by his peaceful face and gently closed eyes. This intimate position, in stark contrast with the formality in which she addresses the gentleman, creates an unsettling mood paramount to the cheeky nature of Prince’s works. Many of these subtle details would likely have gone unnoticed in the original cartoon, as both the scale and the context of a magazine promote casual skimming rather than detailed analysis. However, through his particular style of appropriation, Prince redefines the source material, blurring the lines between social codes, destabilizing hierarchies, and opening up a new world of free love. Read More Artist Bio Richard Prince American • 1947 Follow For more than three decades, Prince's universally celebrated practice has pursued the subversive strategy of appropriating commonplace imagery and themes – such as photographs of quintessential Western cowboys and "biker chicks," the front covers of nurse romance novellas, and jokes and cartoons – to decon
Property from a Private Collector Richard Prince Follow Free Love #233 signed, partially titled and dated "Richard Prince 2015 #233" on the overlap inkjet, acrylic and oilstick on canvas 74 3/8 x 54 3/4 in. (189 x 139 cm.) Executed in 2015.
Condition Report Request Condition Report Thank you for your request. The Condition Report will be sent shortly. Contact Us * Required Send me the Report Via Email Fax Contact Specialist Cancel Provenance Sadie Coles HQ, London Acquired from the above by the present owner Exhibited London, Sadie Coles HQ, Richard Prince Free Love , April 12 - June 18, 2016, no. 12, n.p. (illustrated) Catalogue Essay Richard collected some nudist cartoons by this guy John Dempsey. He inked jetted them up and drew a kind of hippie cartoon… kind of like his hippie drawings that he did back in the late eighties. He turned the nudist cartoon into something about free love. Richard always wanted to be part of a commune, but he knew that kind of utopia would never work out. At least that’s what he told me. He figured it was a good idea, the commune… but in the end… he ended up painting the commune. - Joan Katz As detailed in the above excerpt by Joan Katz, a close friend of Prince’s since 1989, Free Love #233 belongs to a recent body of work in which the artist fuses different elements from many of his earlier, acclaimed series, including his Hippie Drawings, Jokes, and Cartoons. The background of the composition is a reproduction of a Playboy magazine cartoon, enlarged to life size and rendered in full color. Prince then overlays the cartoon with a bold quasi-abstract figure, in the style of his widely recognizable Hippie Drawings from the late 1980s that pay homage to modernist masters like Picasso and de Kooning. The painted figure obscures the cartoon with its elongated arms and oversized hands, while its vivid yellow hue enhances the composition with a joyful overtone only heightened by the figure’s wide, laughing smile. Carefully selected gaps in the hippie’s reach reveal candid moments in the original source material. In the upper left, an embracing couple seems more loving than obscene. On the lower right, the original cartoonist’s signature is revealed, but overlaid with a spiral line - Prince's way of adding his own mark. His decision to incorporate an abstract shape rather than an identifiable signature is typical of the artist’s irreverent questioning of traditional notions of authorship. As Prince himself writes: “You can take my work and do anything you want with it. I will not object… What’s genuine anyway?” (Richard Prince quoted in “Rock Lobster: October 20”, Birdtalk , 2017, online) Another hallmark feature of Prince’s practice highlighted in this body of work is his iconic use of text, also appropriated and often humorous. In a nod to his Joke paintings, the lower section of the canvas includes a caption that reads: “Can’t you find a shady nook somewhere else, Mr. Martinez?” The question is presumably posed by the woman sitting in the foreground of the busy outdoor scene whose lap cradles the head of a mustache-bearing man--the shade she references is cast by her sizeable bosom. The man’s position is surprisingly unsexual and almost fetal in nature, further emphasized by his peaceful face and gently closed eyes. This intimate position, in stark contrast with the formality in which she addresses the gentleman, creates an unsettling mood paramount to the cheeky nature of Prince’s works. Many of these subtle details would likely have gone unnoticed in the original cartoon, as both the scale and the context of a magazine promote casual skimming rather than detailed analysis. However, through his particular style of appropriation, Prince redefines the source material, blurring the lines between social codes, destabilizing hierarchies, and opening up a new world of free love. Read More Artist Bio Richard Prince American • 1947 Follow For more than three decades, Prince's universally celebrated practice has pursued the subversive strategy of appropriating commonplace imagery and themes – such as photographs of quintessential Western cowboys and "biker chicks," the front covers of nurse romance novellas, and jokes and cartoons – to decon
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
