Please note our offices will be closed from Friday March 29 through Monday April 1 for Easter. Local pick-ups will start on Tuesday April 2.
      
      
      

LOT 028

BCSFA CGP CPE OC RCA
1919 - 2020
Canadian

Abstract
oil on canvas, 1964
signed and on verso inscribed "8" (circled)
24 x 30 in, 61 x 76.2 cm

Estimate: $20,000 - $30,000 CAD

Sold for: $109,250

Preview at: Heffel Toronto – 13 Hazelton Ave

PROVENANCE
Acquired directly from the Artist, 1964
By descent to the present Private Collection, British Columbia


By the 1960s, Gordon Smith was well established in modernist circles in Vancouver and on the national art scene. He had trained in San Francisco and studied art history at Harvard University. Travel, along with exposure to modernist trends, had informed his keen and inquiring spirit - he spent most of 1960 in England and Europe on a Canada Council senior fellowship. Smith’s ease with the language of abstraction is clear in this richly hued, dynamic painting. His use of a horizontal movement of forms across colour fields is a development from his early 1960s abstracted landscapes, which included elements derived from beachscapes and city views at the water’s edge. However, here Smith takes a further step into abstraction; we are immersed in a surface of saturated colour in which flashes of red, purple, gold and orange gleam against a backdrop of turquoise drifting in deep cobalt, suggesting illusory depths. Then the white field pulls us back to the surface as it slips off the picture plane at the lower corner. Smith’s masterful command of the elements of this abstract composition is exhilarating.


Estimate: $20,000 - $30,000 CAD

All prices are in Canadian Dollars


Although great care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of the information posted, errors and omissions may occur. All bids are subject to our Terms and Conditions of Business. Bidders must ensure they have satisfied themselves with the condition of the Lot prior to bidding. Condition reports are available upon request.