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Déesse lune
Isabelle Schenckbecher-Quint
Painting - 100 x 50 x 2 cm Painting - 39.4 x 19.7 x 0.8 inch
£1,066
Let the music play
Ines Khadraoui
Painting - 146 x 114 x 4 cm Painting - 57.5 x 44.9 x 1.6 inch
£3,555
Yuki the young yak (White)
Mark Ryden
Sculpture - 43.2 x 30.5 x 25.4 cm Sculpture - 17 x 12 x 10 inch
£1,600
Gentlemen prefer blondes
Patricia Gadisseur
Painting - 100 x 120 x 2.5 cm Painting - 39.4 x 47.2 x 1 inch
£978
Temporary Shelter
Teona Yamanidze
Painting - 50 x 50 x 3 cm Painting - 19.7 x 19.7 x 1.2 inch
£2,488 £2,115
Triptychon
Agnes von Rogister
Fine Art Drawings - 70 x 50 x 0.5 cm Fine Art Drawings - 27.6 x 19.7 x 0.2 inch
£1,786
La part des Anges - the Angels' share
Bze Bzeland
Painting - 42 x 29.7 cm Painting - 16.5 x 11.7 inch
£222
Endless Solitude
Valeria De Santis
Painting - 180 x 140 x 3 cm Painting - 70.9 x 55.1 x 1.2 inch
£3,706
Midnight love
Valeria De Santis
Painting - 150 x 100 x 3 cm Painting - 59.1 x 39.4 x 1.2 inch
£3,279
Lewis Carroll - Die jagd nach dem snark
Max Ernst
Print - 33 x 25 x 0.1 cm Print - 13 x 9.8 x 0 inch
£2,488
No title (Waiting room)
Anna Wardega
Fine Art Drawings - 25 x 35 cm Fine Art Drawings - 9.8 x 13.8 inch
£222
Cinematography inspired session #24
Grzegorz Sikorski
Photography - 60 x 45 x 0.1 cm Photography - 23.6 x 17.7 x 0 inch
£169
Cinematography inspired session #25
Grzegorz Sikorski
Photography - 60 x 45 x 0.1 cm Photography - 23.6 x 17.7 x 0 inch
£169
Cinematography inspired session #26
Grzegorz Sikorski
Photography - 60 x 45 x 0.1 cm Photography - 23.6 x 17.7 x 0 inch
£169
Matador III
Grzegorz Sikorski
Photography - 60 x 45 x 0.1 cm Photography - 23.6 x 17.7 x 0 inch
£169
El Color Grana IV
Grzegorz Sikorski
Photography - 35 x 60 x 0.1 cm Photography - 13.8 x 23.6 x 0 inch
£169
Aziz, blanc et vert
Baptiste Laurent
Sculpture - 20 x 15 x 15 cm Sculpture - 7.9 x 5.9 x 5.9 inch
£667
Equilibre
Nell et Domingo Politi
Sculpture - 200 x 70 x 1 cm Sculpture - 78.7 x 27.6 x 0.4 inch
£4,088
Sur le fil #5
Juliette Marie Regnier
Painting - 61 x 45 x 2 cm Painting - 24 x 17.7 x 0.8 inch
£3,212
Sur le fil#3
Juliette Marie Regnier
Painting - 100 x 81 x 2 cm Painting - 39.4 x 31.9 x 0.8 inch
£3,869
Morning Takes Shape No. 1
Jon Gilchrist
Painting - 61 x 91 x 2.54 cm Painting - 24 x 35.8 x 1 inch
£3,359
Fille coréenne et chat
Sounya Whang
Painting - 50 x 60 x 0.1 cm Painting - 19.7 x 23.6 x 0 inch
£1,153
Osiria Rose
Four Winds Artistry
Painting - 76.2 x 76.2 x 1.7 cm Painting - 30 x 30 x 0.7 inch
£2,327
Travelling out of a Pandemic
Daniel Marcoux
Painting - 183 x 101.6 x 3.8 cm Painting - 72 x 40 x 1.5 inch
£3,386
Tempête de couleurs
Daniel Marcoux
Painting - 122 x 152.4 x 3.8 cm Painting - 48 x 60 x 1.5 inch
£3,386
The Lost Feathers
Gudmundur Sigurdsson
Painting - 51 x 61 x 4 cm Painting - 20.1 x 24 x 1.6 inch
£4,132
Emerald Orgasm
Rakel Routarinne
Painting - 100 x 120 x 2.5 cm Painting - 39.4 x 47.2 x 1 inch
£4,417
Shreds of Memory V
Jakub Pasierkiewicz
Photography - 100 x 70 x 0.3 cm Photography - 39.4 x 27.6 x 0.1 inch
£1,000
Shreds of Memory II
Jakub Pasierkiewicz
Photography - 70 x 100 x 0.3 cm Photography - 27.6 x 39.4 x 0.1 inch
£1,000
Où est Charlie ? V
Tanguy Mendrisse
Photography - 30 x 24 x 0.1 cm Photography - 11.8 x 9.4 x 0 inch
£111
Liberty
Rakhmet Redzhepov (Ramzi)
Painting - 65 x 90 x 2 cm Painting - 25.6 x 35.4 x 0.8 inch
£1,066
Pink Champagne Motel, Wildwood, New Jersey
Richard Heeps
Photography - 80 x 63.5 x 0.1 cm Photography - 31.5 x 25 x 0 inch
£700
The sense of silence
Sandra Vibe
Painting - 80 x 120 x 3 cm Painting - 31.5 x 47.2 x 1.2 inch
£1,466
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!