Sold for: $115,250

PROVENANCE
Collection of the family of Paul-Vanier Beaulieu, Laval

This fiery canvas is a late example of Jean McEwen’s Cellules (Cells) paintings, a series of canvases he began in 1958. These works represented the culmination of the techniques he had developed throughout the 1950s - shimmering light effects, architectonic arrangements, softly impastoed surfaces - and calcified them into what became his most recognizable pictorial language. Here, paint is applied in stratified, porous layers, creating an interplay between opacity and transparency. Colour is applied in thick textures and thinned glazes: oranges, yellows and ochres are laid over and beneath deeper crimsons and carmines that produce a roiling, incendiary internal glow. Emerging from these energetic eruptions are subtle, almost imperceptible geometries. The prominent central division is bordered by two echoing vertical ripples that seem to recede and billow across the surface. Less distinct is the ethereal rectilinear form in the bottom half of the canvas - perhaps the “cell” of the title - which seems to float out of the haze of colour. Barely perceived, it is formed in the negative, a void emerging from the rifts between colours - skilfully showcasing McEwen’s lyrical explorations of depth, vibrancy of colour and texture.

All prices are in Canadian Dollars