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I Am Beautiful - Swan - Lake
Trayko Popov
Painting - 80 x 80 x 2 cm Painting - 31.5 x 31.5 x 0.8 inch
£1,600
El papel como materia y el hilo como símbolo
Francesca Poza
Painting - 65 x 65 cm Painting - 25.6 x 25.6 inch
£2,577
Existence 4
Shijirbaatar Jambalsuren
Painting - 45 x 50 x 1 cm Painting - 17.7 x 19.7 x 0.4 inch
£1,773
Abstraction #3
Carlos Arriagada
Photography - 50 x 40 x 0.1 cm Photography - 19.7 x 15.7 x 0 inch
£1,111
Abstraction #2
Carlos Arriagada
Photography - 50 x 40 x 0.1 cm Photography - 19.7 x 15.7 x 0 inch
£1,244
Sin título. Serie Selvática
Dario Berterreche
Painting - 110 x 90 x 0.1 cm Painting - 43.3 x 35.4 x 0 inch
£479
The adventures of the desert
Mariusz Makula
Painting - 80 x 89.9 x 2 cm Painting - 31.5 x 35.4 x 0.8 inch
£415
Streets of Northern City
Mariusz Makula
Painting - 80 x 100.1 x 4.1 cm Painting - 31.5 x 39.4 x 1.6 inch
£415
Industrial mindset
Laurent Proneur
Painting - 152.4 x 213.4 x 5.1 cm Painting - 60 x 84 x 2 inch
£20,650
Sunset Over the Kingdom
Grégoire Devin
Painting - 180.3 x 180.3 x 5.1 cm Painting - 71 x 71 x 2 inch
£14,430
White Grass / Graminées Plumes
Vinciane Closset
Painting - 80 x 120 x 2 cm Painting - 31.5 x 47.2 x 0.8 inch
£1,422
The world has gone blue
Thomas Lesigne
Painting - 23 x 28 x 0.1 cm Painting - 9.1 x 11 x 0 inch
£880
Encre II
Maylis Bourdet
Fine Art Drawings - 59 x 44 x 1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 23.2 x 17.3 x 0.4 inch
£498
Ondulazioni vibratorie
Piero Cipolat
Sculpture - 122 x 122 x 5 cm Sculpture - 48 x 48 x 2 inch
£5,630
At Home papier déchiré 300 grammes
Bows
Painting - 74 x 57 x 5 cm Painting - 29.1 x 22.4 x 2 inch
£1,333
Crock de toi royal - ultra white
Ninu
Sculpture - 30 x 30 x 17 cm Sculpture - 11.8 x 11.8 x 6.7 inch
£3,999
The Field of Eisenstein III
Ihar Barkhatkou
Painting - 150 x 200 x 3 cm Painting - 59.1 x 78.7 x 1.2 inch
£5,332
Coupelle de vanités
Philippe Pasqua
Sculpture - 28 x 45 x 35 cm Sculpture - 11 x 17.7 x 13.8 inch
£22,218
Chaotic Memories - Disjointed reality #20
Kris Haas
Painting - 94 x 68 x 0.25 cm Painting - 37 x 26.8 x 0.1 inch
£2,266
En équilibre
Marie-Odile Wagner
Painting - 100 x 100 x 2 cm Painting - 39.4 x 39.4 x 0.8 inch
£1,422
We are all martyrs (3) (after pina bausch) forbidden collage (12)
Julien Delagrange
Painting - 150 x 135 x 0.1 cm Painting - 59.1 x 53.1 x 0 inch
£5,546
Bearing the fruit (3) forbidden production (4)
Julien Delagrange
Painting - 140 x 142 x 0.1 cm Painting - 55.1 x 55.9 x 0 inch
£5,119
Duke And Duchess of Cambridge Call Time
Chris Jackson
Photography - 51 x 76 x 0.001 cm Photography - 20.1 x 29.9 x 0 inch
£978
Concave
Nicolas Sanchez
Fine Art Drawings - 45.7 x 50.8 x 3.8 cm Fine Art Drawings - 18 x 20 x 1.5 inch
£4,976
Untitled 66
Lucio Forte
Fine Art Drawings - 24 x 33 x 0.1 cm Fine Art Drawings - 9.4 x 13 x 0 inch
£89
White Series n3
Rosario Briones
Painting - 159.8 x 99.8 x 0.3 cm Painting - 62.9 x 39.3 x 0.1 inch
£3,151
White Series n2
Rosario Briones
Painting - 159.8 x 99.8 x 0.3 cm Painting - 62.9 x 39.3 x 0.1 inch
£3,151
Natural Flow Series n9
Rosario Briones
Painting - 137.9 x 108 x 0.3 cm Painting - 54.3 x 42.5 x 0.1 inch
£3,151
Natural Flow Series n5
Rosario Briones
Painting - 160 x 119.9 x 0.3 cm Painting - 63 x 47.2 x 0.1 inch
£3,317
Liquid Life Series n3.
Rosario Briones
Painting - 230.9 x 148.8 x 0.3 cm Painting - 90.9 x 58.6 x 0.1 inch
£3,981
Zero-kW/h-Objekt II
Selçuk Dizlek
Sculpture - 63 x 63 x 5 cm Sculpture - 24.8 x 24.8 x 2 inch
£4,355
Liquid Life Series n6
Rosario Briones
Painting - 211.8 x 99.8 x 0.3 cm Painting - 83.4 x 39.3 x 0.1 inch
£3,566
Sans titre 9. Série Skull
Christophe Faso
Fine Art Drawings - 30 x 30 x 0.2 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11.8 x 11.8 x 0.1 inch
£444
Sans titre 8. Série Skull
Christophe Faso
Fine Art Drawings - 30 x 30 x 0.2 cm Fine Art Drawings - 11.8 x 11.8 x 0.1 inch
£444
All these things in my head
Emily Starck
Painting - 115 x 95 x 3 cm Painting - 45.3 x 37.4 x 1.2 inch
£2,311
Over my dead body!
David Carey
Photography - 41 x 30 x 0.1 cm Photography - 16.1 x 11.8 x 0 inch
£88
No regret
Cynthia Coulombe-Bégin
Painting - 121.9 x 121.9 x 3.8 cm Painting - 48 x 48 x 1.5 inch
£3,110
Cage / Sans titre
Meteo Meteo
Painting - 29.7 x 21 x 0.2 cm Painting - 11.7 x 8.3 x 0.1 inch
£102 £61
Contemporary portrait "Disco Club"
Nataliya Bagatskaya
Painting - 100 x 65 x 2.2 cm Painting - 39.4 x 25.6 x 0.9 inch
£2,222
Silencieusement, elle glissait sur l’air
Maylis Bourdet
Painting - 90 x 90 x 2 cm Painting - 35.4 x 35.4 x 0.8 inch
£1,209
Kiliney Beach - Ireland
Marko Fenske
Painting - 38.1 x 48.3 x 0.5 cm Painting - 15 x 19 x 0.2 inch
£663
Peau de mur 26
Pascale Morelot-Palu
Painting - 100 x 73 x 3 cm Painting - 39.4 x 28.7 x 1.2 inch
£1,831
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!