Robert Nava - 20th Century & Contemporary Art & Design Day Sale Hong Kong Tuesday, June 21, 2022 | Phillips

20th Century & Contemporary Art & Design Day Sale

Hong Kong Auction 21 June 2022

  • “I know what I’m doing. It’s carefully done wrong.” 
    — Robert Nava
     

    Visually jarring yet irresistibly eye-catching, Robert Nava’s 2018 work Boiler Room is a prime example of the artist's celebrated oeuvre. The canvas is divided into two sections of black and grey. A red-eyed devilish face with spikey yellow teeth emerges from the grey background,  its form given by the roughly spray painted bright red outlines that define its features. Strands of electric blue, bright yellow and mint spray paint run freely across the canvas, bringing to mind the sensation of having electric currents coursing through the body. This visually charged work stimulates the viewer to a heightened sense of perception that one might not voluntarily submit to, instilling the energetic compositon into the depths of the mind.

     

     

     

    Robert Nava in his studio

    Image Courtesy of Avant Arte.com

     

     

    Having completed his Master of Fine Arts at Yale University, Nava broke free from the artistic concepts and art historical traditions that he was so well versed in, to find his way back to the untrammeled and unlearned art of childhood. His work is imbued with a sense of freedom and arbitrariness at first glance, reminiscent of the spontaneity champnioned by American Jean-Michel Basquiat with his energetically composed paintings. Nava’s paintings bring back to us the imaginative freedom that we all enjoyed as little children, which somehow seems estranged and alien to us as adults.

      

    Born in Indiana and based in Brooklyn, Nava has captured the attention of the international art scene ever since the Art Institute of Chicago had acquired four of his works on paper into their collection in early 2020.  Pace Gallery announced the representation of the artist later in that year, holding two solo shows for Nava that instantly sold out. 

     

    In 2021, Vito Schnabel Gallery announced joint representation of Nava, holding a solo exhibition for him in the same year. Nava has recently been honoured with another solo show hosted by Night Gallery in Los Angeles, Bloodsport, which ran from 19 February to 26 March 2022, focusing on works on paper by the artist. His solo exhibition with PACE London, Thunderbolt Disco, has just opened 13 May and will close 25 June 2022.

     

    Nava’s works have found places in prominent collections such as the Art Institute of Chicago, the ICA Miami, and Zuzeum Art Centre in Latvia.

    • Provenance

      Private Collection, USA (acquired directly from the artist)
      Acquired from the above by the present owner

    • Artist Biography

      Robert Nava

      Robert Nava (b. 1985) is a contemporary artist based in Brooklyn, New York. Using a rough and
      free-flowing hand, Nava recreates the innocent and unlearned art of childhood. His works are
      “carefully done wrong,” subverting the rigid fundamentals of painting and conventions of
      completeness that Nava learned as an MFA student at Yale University. Nava’s paintings often
      feature imagined mythological figures and histories of the artist’s creation whose drama is
      brought to life with the frenetic energy of the artist’s brush. 

       
      View More Works

116

Robert Nava

Boiler Room

signed, titled and dated '"BOILER ROOM" Nava 18' on the reverse
spray paint, marker and acrylic on canvas
122 x 122.2 cm. (48 x 48 1/8 in.)
Executed in 2018.

Full Cataloguing

Estimate
HK$1,200,000 - 2,200,000 
€145,000-266,000
$154,000-282,000

Sold for HK$3,906,000

Contact Specialist

Danielle So
Specialist, Head of Day Sale
+852 2318 2027
danielleso@phillips.com

20th Century & Contemporary Art & Design Day Sale

Hong Kong Auction 21 June 2022