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Natation sur cyclo
Muriel Bordier
Photography - 90 x 190 x 1 cm Photography - 35.4 x 74.8 x 0.4 inch
$6,170
Marée haute
Muriel Bordier
Photography - 90 x 190 x 1 cm Photography - 35.4 x 74.8 x 0.4 inch
$6,170
Bird and flower
Juffrouw Springtouw
Painting - 40 x 50 x 2 cm Painting - 15.7 x 19.7 x 0.8 inch
$1,066
Ecstasy of St Teresa (medium)
Jesus Torio
Photography - 84.1 x 57.7 x 0.2 cm Photography - 33.1 x 22.7 x 0.1 inch
$1,458
Into the darkness (medium)
Jesus Torio
Photography - 32.29 x 84.1 x 0.2 cm Photography - 12.7 x 33.1 x 0.1 inch
$1,458
The space between II
Claire Smith
Painting - 80 x 80 x 4 cm Painting - 31.5 x 31.5 x 1.6 inch
$2,093
Painting research 14
Hongyu Zhang
Painting - 160 x 150 x 1 cm Painting - 63 x 59.1 x 0.4 inch
$7,629
Painting research 11
Hongyu Zhang
Painting - 150 x 160 x 1 cm Painting - 59.1 x 63 x 0.4 inch
$7,068
Painting research 10
Hongyu Zhang
Painting - 150 x 150 x 1 cm Painting - 59.1 x 59.1 x 0.4 inch
$6,844
Les ancêtres I
Soly Cissé
Fine Art Drawings - 30 x 42 x 1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11.8 x 16.5 x 0.4 inch
$1,683
Lapin ou ne pas être
Michèle Corotti
Painting - 100 x 50 x 2 cm Painting - 39.4 x 19.7 x 0.8 inch
$898
Composition Abstraite Ref AB0248
Jean-Marie Ledannois
Painting - 51 x 40 cm Painting - 20.1 x 15.7 inch
$561
Glaciers Melting
Adriano Bernetti da Vila
Painting - 80 x 80 x 4.5 cm Painting - 31.5 x 31.5 x 1.8 inch
$5,385
Long day's journey into tomorrow
Elena Raceala
Photography - 91.4 x 61 cm Photography - 36 x 24 inch
$1,346
Spinning Antlers
Moises Morgenstern
Sculpture - 160 x 86.4 x 50.8 cm Sculpture - 63 x 34 x 20 inch
$23,000
Cette fois ci on part quand même
Véronique Clanet
Painting - 92 x 73 cm Painting - 36.2 x 28.7 inch
$6,956
Offering. Supplication
Kerry Campbell
Painting - 121.9 x 91.4 x 7.6 cm Painting - 48 x 36 x 3 inch
$2,200
Eavesdropping. Hello.
Kerry Campbell
Painting - 121.9 x 91.4 x 7.6 cm Painting - 48 x 36 x 3 inch
$2,200
Câblages (Kabelage)
Henrik Jacob
Fine Art Drawings - 30 x 20 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11.8 x 7.9 inch
$898
Figure néo-moderniste - Art brut
Luco
Painting - 65 x 46 x 2 cm Painting - 25.6 x 18.1 x 0.8 inch
$561
Back to life, back to reality
Vasil Angelov
Print - 70 x 100 x 0.2 cm Print - 27.6 x 39.4 x 0.1 inch
$830
La mauvaise rencontre
Laurent Proneur
Painting - 182.9 x 152.4 x 5.1 cm Painting - 72 x 60 x 2 inch
$50,100
Sans titre (tea time)
Christos Kalfas
Fine Art Drawings - 24 x 24 x 0.2 cm Fine Art Drawings - 9.4 x 9.4 x 0.1 inch
$841
L'onde sonore envahit l'atelier du peintre
Jean Le Gac
Print - 76 x 56 cm Print - 29.9 x 22 inch
$617
The Unseen but Always Present (1))
Alejandra Leon
Photography - 50 x 70 x 0.3 cm Photography - 19.7 x 27.6 x 0.1 inch
$1,000
The Unseen but Always Present (2)
Alejandra Leon
Photography - 50 x 70 x 0.3 cm Photography - 19.7 x 27.6 x 0.1 inch
$1,000
Habitación 1
Alejandra Leon
Photography - 50 x 70 x 0.3 cm Photography - 19.7 x 27.6 x 0.1 inch
$1,200
White
In physics, white is the sum of all the colours. To the human eye, white appears to be the total absence of colour. Amongst artists, white and its many uses in art are continuously evolving and challenging those who would embrace them. Is white, then, a non-colour, or an enhancer of colours? Intangible or material? Absence or excess?
Since Antiquity, white has been appreciated for its symbolic value. In Ancient Greece, where they would paint their statues, it was a sign of incompletion, whereas the Romans believed it showed pomp and imperialist virtue. With the rise of Christianity, white was used in opposition to black in order to emphasise moral dichotomies: the pure, divine white against the darkness. In some cases, however, white was used to show sickness or death, most notably in the pallid representations of the skeletal, crucified Christ.
In the Renaissance white was used to sublimate faces and backgrounds. Da Vinci even based his sfumato technique on the soft transition from light into darkness. Throughout the history of painting, white was considered precious for its ability to reflect light. It attracts the gaze even when used in the tiniest quantities, and illuminates the subject, drawing out stunning contrasts as seen in the works of Rembrandt, or in Vermeer's famous Girl with the Pearl Earring.
With the rise of Impressionism, white was used as the brightest tone amongst shades of grey. While Manet produced canvases which were forerunners to monochromes, including The Reader, which was almost pure white, Monet delivered a stunning gradient of whites whilst recreating the snow at his home in Giverny. The first true white monochrome appeared with the arrival of Malevitch's White Square on a White Background. The artist said 'I have broken the blue boundary of colour limits, and come out into the white'.
Modernists were equally passionate about white and valued it incredibly highly. Miro in particular questioned the status of white on canvases. In his painting Woman, Bird and Star white is in parts boldly painted, but is also distinctive for its absence around the star. Picasso, on the other hand, explored white in conjunction with his famous coloured periods. Piero Manzoni became famous thanks to his 'achromatic' paintings, a series of canvases produced exclusively in shades of white. Moving into the 20th century, white became synonymous with minimalist abstraction. For artists like Kandinsky, white was a cosmic colour, associated with a spiritual search for the absolute, guiding the artists as he seek to express his emotions.
Today, white remains an ever popular subject. Roman Opalka made his name creating a series of white numbers of a white background, while Daniel Arsham reinvents white walls in galleries by letting his artwork drip down onto them. White is a colour with multiple symbolic interpretations. The colour of divinity or humility; of purity and immaculate, of emptiness and absence, but always colour. If blue has Klein and red has Rothko, it appears that no artist has yet succeeded in fully mastering white – but maybe you'll find them in our selection!