Regarded as a “young woman who was immersed in the vanguard of abstraction at a pivotal moment, just as it was becoming airborne,” Judith Rothschild infused her paintings with a Cubist flair, combined with the pioneering abstraction of the mid-century New York school.i Strong outlines and bold swathes of color comprise her compositions, as seen in the present work, Figure in Space, 1960, which was first unveiled at the artist’s 1962 exhibition at the Knapik Gallery in New York and would later be included in her 2002-2003 retrospective in Eastern Europe. The mosaic-like background of lavenders and grays interspersed with warm bursts of pink, orange and yellow encompass the background of the composition, while short and abrupt black contour lines form the “figure” of flattened squares and rectangles in the upper center. Having moved to California in 1947 and later returning to New York in the late 1960s, Rothschild's output of the 1950s and early 1960s would become inspired by her time on the West Coast, integrating various shades of color to depict forms with softer, less defined edges as compared to her work from the 1940s.
A detail of the present work. Coming of age as an artist in New York at the height of Abstract Expressionism, Rothschild studied at the Art Students League with Reginald Marsh, and then with Hans Hofmann in his studio, where she first began to experiment with abstraction. In 1945, she became a member of the Jane Street Gallery, a cooperative in New York’s West Village, alongside Nell Blaine and Larry Rivers, staging her first solo exhibition at the gallery in December of 1945. Remaining an active member of the arts community and an avid collector of works by artists like Mondrian, Picasso and Matisse, Rothschild spent the later part of her life promoting underrepresented artists and their estates. Today, Rothschild’s works are included in the renowned permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C, the Tate Modern, London, and the Centre Pompidou, Paris.
i Rachel Youens, “Judith Rothschild: Image and Abstraction,” The Brooklyn Rail, March–April 2002, online.
Provenance
Estate of the Artist
The Judith Rothschild Foundation
Acquired from the above by the present ownerExhibited
New York, Knapik Gallery, Judith Rothschild: Recent Oils and Collages, April 3–31, 1962
St. Petersburg, The State Russian Museum (pp. 98–100, illustrated); Wuppertal, Germany, The Von der Heydt-Museum (pp. 96–97, illustrated, p. 97), Judith Rothschild, June 13, 2002–January 4, 2004Literature
Jack Flam, Judith Rothschild: An Artist’s Search, New York, 1998, fig. 41, pp. 56–57 (illustrated, p. 57)
130
Figure in Space
signed "Rothschild" lower right; signed and titled "Figure in Space Rothschild" on the reverse
oil on canvas
40 x 50 in. (101.6 x 127 cm)
Painted circa 1958–1960.
This work is registered with The Judith Rothschild Foundation as catalogue no. 58.12.
Estimate
$10,000 - 15,000
Sold for $30,480
Annie Dolan
NY Head of Auctions and Specialist, Head of Sale, Morning Session
212 940 1288
adolan@phillips.com
Modern & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Morning Session
New York Auction 15 May 2024
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