Lot 270
Harold Frank (American born in England, 1921-1995). "Cherry Red Floral" oil on canvas, n.d. Signed at lower right. A gorgeous still life painting by Harold Frank featuring a floral arrangement in a piriform white vase beside spherical fruits, all rendered in brilliant hues of scarlet, cobalt, emerald, cyan, and lemon against a soft background of pastel rose, azure, and white hues. The composition is depicted in an Abstract-Expressionist manner with Frank's signature expressive loose brushstrokes, lyrical contouring lines, and vibrant colors. The luscious bouquet overflows with energy and movement, the flowers blossoming in firework-like explosions that radiate outward in beautiful strokes of color, obfuscating and defining all at once. Size: 24" W x 30" H (61 cm x 76.2 cm)
Harold Frank immigrated with his family to the US through Ellis Island. Growing up in the tenements of the Lower East Side in New York City during the era of the Great Depression and World War II, Frank found Abstract Expressionism to be the ideal means to explore the angst of his world. He once stated, "I can live with the abstract. Life is a mystery."
Frank studied at the Art Students League in New York, the National Academy of Design, the Pratt Institute, the Chouinard Art Institute, and UCLA where he was a colleague of Richard Diebenkorn (American, 1922-1993), an artist who is oftentimes associated with Abstract Expressionism as well as a pioneer of the Bay Area Figurative Movement. In addition to Diebenkorn, Frank's influences include DeKooning, Picasso, Matisse, and Rouault. While he also created landscapes, non-objective abstract compositions, and still-life paintings, figures and head studies were the predominant theme of his oeuvre.
For more about Harold Frank, see Sandie Stern's monograph "Harold Frank Abstract Expressionist 1921-1995" (2001).
Provenance: private Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA collection, acquired via descent, purchased June 25, 1973
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#174800
- Condition: Painting in excellent overall condition with some expected craquelure to paint commensurate with age. Signed at lower right. Old collection label on verso.
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