Oct 03, 2013 - Sale 2323

Sale 2323 - Lot 63

Price Realized: $ 25,000
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 20,000 - $ 30,000
HUGHIE LEE-SMITH (1915 - 1999)
Infinity (Infinity Seascape).

Oil on linen canvas, circa 1970. 508x610 mm; 20x24 inches. Signed in oil, lower left.

Provenance: the estate of the artist; thence by descent to the current owner.

This oil painting is a very strong example of the artist's mid-career "metaphysical" phase, which began in the early 1960s. Lee-Smith moved away from social realism and his figurative scenes left the abandoned lots and rooftops of Detroit and New York. Here, as in many of his 1960 and '70s paintings, the tension between isolated figures is loosely defined and existential, but with typical Lee-Smith elements of a mysterious waterfront.