A Cubist record: This early Picasso painting

Femme assise
a 1909 Cubist work by Pablo Picasso
courtesy of Sotheby's

Femme assise

Picasso painted Femme Assise, which was inspired by his lover Fernande Olivier, while in a small Spanish village called Horta de Ebro, accessible only by mule. There, Picasso further developed the revolutionary Cubist style, distorting his subject through the use of angular geometric forms, that he had begun two years before with his groundbreaking Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907).

Experts have described the period as being “the most crucial and productive” in his career.

Femme Assise (1909), which was last sold publicly in London for £340,000 in 1973, is regarded as one of the artist’s greatest Cubist portraits. It was sold for £43.2 million ($63.4 million) at a Sotheby's London auction on June 21, 2016, almost $20 million more than the original estimate.

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Ming Ma: The Artist Upstairs

“I appreciate different faces. People’s faces are emblems of our ever-changing society, and I like to add my own imagination and creativity to their appearance, recreating or rearranging, both the familiar and unfamiliar, in which you may find a part of yourself in each person.” - Ming Ma

Romantica
2015, Pen on paper,
 21 x 15 cm 
(The cover work of Yon Fan’s
recent publication Romantica)    

Heart to Heart
2012, Oil on paper, 47 x 35 cm

Sotheby’s Hong Kong Gallery will present the selling exhibition Ming Ma: The Artist Upstairs from 25 August to 2 September 2016. While Ming works with a variety of mediums, this exhibition will highlight more than 50 portraits and illustrations. The artist thrives on the expression, in an abstract and minimal style, of the fine details of beauty and despair in our society, and is renowned for the exaggerated and unusual character profiles in his portraits.

A long-time illustrator for filmmaker Yon Fan’s publications and his magazine column, The Artist Upstairs, Ming Ma’s collaborations with the filmmaker emphasise a particular scene and moment in time with Yon’s poetic inscriptions completing each work as a unique backdrop. Ming’s distinctive use of colour and line in his portraits add another dynamic to the compelling compositions of each figure portrayed.

Jasmine Yan, Gallery Director, Sotheby’s Hong Kong Gallery, says, “Ming Ma is a home-grown Hong Kong artist who skilfully applies the unusual combination of oil on paper as core material. His compositions are often composed of deep shades of primary colour bringing a sense of solitude to the viewer. Both his earlier oil on paper pieces and more recent pen on paper works follow this rare and unconventional style. This summer, Sotheby's Hong Kong Gallery is delighted to present a selection of Ming Ma's recent works. Our audiences are invited to experience the artist’s emotions and imagination towards his subjects, scenes or moments in time. The exhibition will also feature a series of his illustration works with Yon Fan’s inscriptions, which further enhance the creative backdrop of the works and present a dialogue between the two artists.”

ABOUT MING MA
Born in Hong Kong in 1959, Ming Ma graduated from design school before embarking upon his professional career in the creative industry. The artist branched into photography, interior design and art direction for film prior to opening his famed ceramics studio ‘M’s Ma’ in Hong Kong, after which he dedicated himself wholeheartedly into painting. A major illustration artist for renowned filmmaker Yon Fan, the artist has illustrated nearly all his publications, including the recently released Romantica, as well as his early work series The Artist Upstairs. Ming Ma has participated in numerous museum-scale group exhibitions, as well as a solo exhibition, Ming Ma Ceramics, Hong Kong Ceramics in Taipei, at Taipei 101 in 2004.

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Photos from Sotheby's Hong Kong.

馬明：樓上畫家

《桃李爭春》
2012年作
油彩、紙，47.5 x 35.1 公分

「我很喜歡欣賞不同的面孔，人的輪廓千變萬化，而我又可以加上自己的想像，

再創造，或重新排列組合，可塑性無窮無盡，既熟悉又陌生，你可能在其中找到了自己。」 - 馬明


香港蘇富比藝術空間將於8月25日至9月2日舉行「馬明：樓上畫家」作品展售會，展出本地藝術家馬明約50幅作品。馬明曾以不同媒材進行創作，是次展覽將著重於繪畫與插圖作品。他的創作富立體派與抽象風格，以刻劃誇張獨特的人物輪廓著稱；其擅以微小的尺幅、精緻的細節，呈現他對人類社會中美與絕望的發想。


馬明多年來為知名導演楊凡的著作及《樓上畫家》專欄插畫，其敘寫著重特定的場景與瞬間。畫中不凡的用色及線條透露出的動態成分，不僅引人注目，更鮮活了畫中人物；插圖配上楊導演的題詩，互相呼應，遂成幅幅獨特作品。


香港蘇富比藝術空間策劃總監甄茵表示：「馬明乃香港土生土長的藝術家，擅長運用油彩紙本組合為主要媒材。他的作品多以深沉的原色作主調，帶出一股寂靜寧和的氣氛。其畫風自有個性，不留前人筆法，從早期的油彩紙本創作，以至近年的鋼筆紙本作品盡皆如此。今夏，我們很高興能為觀眾帶來馬明一系列人像畫及插圖作品，讓大家能體會藝術家對畫中人和不同場景的詮釋和想像。今次展出的部分插圖，更會配上楊凡導演的題詩，展示兩位藝術家之間的思想交流。」

關於馬明

《明星》
約2014年作
鋼筆、紙，15.6 x 11.2 公分

馬明1959年出生於香港，自設計學院畢業後隨即在文創領域中開展職業生涯。藝術家早年曾從事攝影、室內設計、電影美術指導等工作，及後創立陶瓷工作室「M’s Ma」，一夕成名。隨後全面投入繪畫創作，且多年來為楊凡導演筆下著作插畫，包括《樓上畫家》系列及最新作品《羅曼蒂卡》。馬明曾經多次參與博物館群展，亦於2004年在台北101舉行「Ming Ma Ceramics, Hong Kong Ceramics in Taipei」個展。

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Photos from Sotheby's Hong Kong.

Bowie / Collector #14

Lewis 

Percy Wyndham Lewis (1882-1957)
CIRCUS SCENE
pen and ink, watercolour and gouache
23.5 by 31.5cm.; 9¼ by 12½in.
Executed in 1913-14
£70,000-100,000

Impresario, polemicist, publisher, writer, painter – Wyndham Lewis was a cult figure in British art and culture of the early 20th century. A perpetual outsider, he brought the speed and fury of Italian Futurism to Britain, combining its obsession with speed and movement with Cubism’s deconstruction of pictorial space.

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Photo from Sotheby's Hong Kong.

Bowie / Collector #13

Sutherland

Graham Sutherland (1903-1980)
THORN BUSH
crayon, charcoal, watercolour, ink and gouache
38 by 23cm.; 15 by 9in.
Executed circa 1947.
£30,000-50,000

Born in South London and trained as a printmaker at Goldsmith’s College of Art, Graham Sutherland was continually inspired by nature and the British landscape.  Thorn bushes and trees were a motif that Sutherland employed since his role on the War Artists Advisory Committee, using the religious connotations and structure thorns to express the harsh reality of an industrialised age.

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Photos from Sotheby's Hong Kong.